


For the sinners

by Deufos42



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Urban Fantasy, Blind Character, Blood and Gore, F/M, I think about the rest later, Kim Woojin-centric, M/M, Minor Character Death, No Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Not the way you expect at least, Religious Discussion, School Shootings, Species Discrimination, Supernatural Elements, Vamp!Chan, Violence, Witchcraft, Wooj can be an asshole in the beginning, a little i guess, hunter!jisung, of course, vamp!soyeon, warlock!seungmin, werewolf!woojin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2020-05-07
Packaged: 2020-05-14 08:37:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 53,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19269640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deufos42/pseuds/Deufos42
Summary: Kim Woojin expected something different from his adult life as a child. He didn't expect his fears to come true, nor would he share daily life with certain creatures - yet many of those childish nightmares still existed, refusing to be domesticated and so needing their control. That was how he found himself responsible for the safety of his people and the care of the possible invasion of the enemy.Until he was cursed by them.





	1. Prologue

 

 

**When faith still needs a gun**

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

" **O** ut." Woojin leaned his torso to the side, his hand shaking to unlock the passenger door and then searching for the shoulder of his companion to simply induce him to leave the car. He didn't know if his sweaty skin was more sensitive to the winds off the side of the road or if the temperature had dropped dramatically since they had left the city to there. He couldn't think very clearly and didn't think it was a question that would be answered immediately. It didn't matter as well when it was the side effect of the situation that seemed less uncomfortable to him by then.

"Wait!" Jisung shifted his feet under the seat, gesturing for Woojin to slow down as clearly the other wasn't at all confident in doing what he had been asked to do. At first, it wasn't such a bad idea; or maybe it was bad enough for Jisung to believe Woojin would be wise not to take the plan forward. "It doesn't have a psychological preparation before... 'u know...?"

“Out. Now.”

 

As if all the context didn't bring enough shivers to Jisung, Woojin's half-growl had just made his breathing all but lose his rhythm for a few seconds. Okay, maybe he should have chosen another profession - but Jisung wasn't a good baker and wasn't a clean enough person to think of cleaning up other things for other people. He also disliked discussions based on plausible arguments and was a shit loser for almost everything. He was terrible to do dressings - which was also necessary in his current job, but not so much - and so he couldn't even be a nurse.

 

"Okay, okay." He took a deep breath as he got out of the car and Woojin immediately threw a pile of junk at his feet that certainly shouldn't even pass near the hands of an eighteen-year-old. Glad Jisung had already done twenty, right? "You aren't polite at all for a person who needs help."

"If you continue, I'll start the car and leave without you." Woojin countered above Jisung's final words, straightening his posture in the driver's seat. He felt the t-shirt glued to his chest and, as cold as he could feel the environment around him, his body was too hot for the sweater tossed into the back seat.

 

Of course, Jisung had to remember often that the situation wasn't the most likely to provoke the eldest. As if he was no longer going to face something that put his life at risk, he didn't want it to end sooner than planned. Meanwhile, Woojin was used to solving his own problems, and Jisung still didn't quite understand how he had been cast to take his place that time. Even though it was much more obvious now than before.

 

"Are you going to tell me what happened when I get back?" He asked as he grabbed his guns on the floor, tucking each one around his shoulders so that it would be practical to pull them out and handle them as needed.

"Isn't it obvious?" Woojin furrowed the space between his eyebrows, which could only be seen by Jisung thanks to moonlight passing through the open door rather than through the front glass, since they had made a point of darkening them long before they really had to. Not counting the wet hair of the other, placed away from his eyes. "Just do what you have to do, come back and then I can finally take off that shirt and take a cold shower."

 

Jisung rolled his eyes but nodded, holding the flashlight in his teeth and lifting his pants before turning on his heels to going inside the forest. He thought that missions in the morning were more difficult until he had to get out of bed two o'clock in the morning behind a not very specific wolf, which Woojin had traced to those surroundings - how? Jisung had no idea, since everything he had to deal with as a hunter in those years was simply what he found by accident or being stupid enough not to know how to hide. A forest was a path without a turn, sometimes even for those who had a compass.

Meanwhile, Woojin had re-closed the door and keep blurred the inside of the car with his strong breath, with that in the current silence could be heard with extreme clarity - as well as his own heart beating and some random movements in a considerable distance near the road and forest. Woojin recognized at least the position of each - target and weapon. As much as he'd been trying to deal with it for days, his head ached and everything still seemed too much. This was the first full moon he had to deal with after the bite he had hidden from everyone inside the quarters. He hoped his knowledge would be worth something to him when he strove to suppress an instinct that he had against his will. Woojin wasn't an animal, he wasn't a monster, but it took a lot of him to stop himself completely from becoming one.

Jisung, in fact, had nothing to do with it. He knew less than Woojin, who had years in his back in experience - and yet he didn't magically track anyone, that specific situation made him think that he was making everything too obvious - but it was inevitable to think that probably because he had so little in his hands, Jisung would still be the most trusting person for not to question when asked to seek the head of the one who had injured him. At first, it was only a vengeful impulse, the rage of having been bitten making Woojin blind to the immediate consequences of his acts; but a second of calm had brought back the realization that it was much more than that. The full moon was making a connection that the hunter wanted it to end - and what better way to stop the growth of something if it doesn't kill it?

He squinted his eyes, lifting his chin as he tossed the rest of his body back, staring at the roof of the car that he couldn't remember being so close to the tip of his nose. Woojin could see every fiber of the material that supported the structure, could see the tiny drops of water accumulated in each corner of that car because of his simple act of breathing - still without any control over the speed of that automatic attitude. He was looking for anything he could cling to for the next few hours, turning away from the growing need to get out of there and disappear into the dense forest around. Two crucial points, however, indicated that it was a bad idea: first there was Jisung, and secondly what Woojin had ordered the other to hunt. He had never count how long it took to find and kill a wolf from a hunter's point of view, but he knew that at that moment - putting himself above the wall - every second dragged on for centuries.

Woojin felt his heart beat in an inhuman rhythm. Unconsciously, his hand tightened on the burning forearm, anxious to let go whatever he was holding. He knew it didn't work that way and his best weapon was still his mind. His body reacted to what he wanted - or what the bite in him caused in each neuron he had. Magic was intent and as stupid as it sounded, even in a world where things no longer worked as they did in the time of their grandparents, it was time to blindly believe that. Even as the developing instinct inside him chewed violently and animally, Woojin resisted, pressing his short nails into his skin, feeling the sweat drip from his jaw to his clavicle.

It was hot. The temperature around him seemed to have tripled, considering that the cold air from when Jisung had left the car had already been replaced by the mass of acidic respiration that was repeatedly expelled by Woojin's lungs. The pain was enough to force him to bite his own tongue. It burned so much. From head to toe. From the first strand of hair to the last cell at the tips of his toes. He moved again, uncomfortable, remotely rusty. His rough hand searched for the half-empty cup of coffee forgotten there from the day before - it had been days gone by without a decent night's sleep, and he had known that the full moon would be just another sum of lost hours with eyes wide open - squeezing the lid in an aggressive motion before spitting the entire contents between the teeth against the edges of paper. The metal taste shouldn't be as pleasurable as it was; Woojin felt his stomach turn, a grunt of dissatisfaction clawing at his throat.

 

"It shouldn't be that long to kill a fucking dog" he mumbled to himself, resisting the urge to crush the paper cup when he put it on the stand next to the panel, more within his field of vision than in the last position.

 

Minutes and minutes until a shot was fired and the pain simply stopped, the heat subsided. A few more extras until Jisung opened the car door, throwing what he had into his backseat, and at first Woojin didn't bother to check - but the strong scent of blood that wasn't his own was denouncing exactly how his order was perfectly fulfilled. Literally.

 

"Oh shit, my car," he concluded in frustration, watching Jisung shrug before his expression turned lighter, as the temperature inside the car softened the cold from the purple lips and white nails where the dried blood hadn't dyed.

"Hm, is there any coffee shop around here?" Jisung asked, leaning over the cup with the intention of picking it up and possibly checking the content when Woojin, uncertain of his own agile reflex, withdrew the same object from the front of the other. "You need a break from work, dude"

"Let's go home," Woojin replied through a quieter breath, minimally lowering the window at his side to throw the cup down the street, the inadequate mixture of blood and coffee staining the road as the car started again.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Holy Dracula." Chan threw back his head and dropped his own shoulders. "What the hell is wrong with you today?"

 

 

 

 **W** oojin was no longer so sure of his headaches. Until a few days ago, everything was a reason to press the index and middle finger on his temples as if this would solve a problem that went well beyond blood pressure - and, by the way, he knew that his own was on the heights by the speed with his heart beat since hours before he put his feet back home. The sleepless night was clearly evident by the dark circles under his eyes, but hidden by the sunglasses and the shade of the open garage door, all that he was bothered to keep is the hose up, without much direction to where to send the jet of water on the old leather bench of the Chevrolet opala. Really old. Jisung had managed to destroy what he no longer had any idea about how to save. In his defense, it was a family heirloom, he just had no feeling involved in the need to keep for himself something that smelled like mothballs and second world war.

Looking from afar, a five-step thing until there was a safe distance from the bumper - which Woojin had always suspected that someday will fall off in a completely inappropriate situation - it was time to leave that big combat machine. Kinda literally. Maybe send it to a junkyard, since there wouldn't be any sensible person who wanted to trade a minimally functional car for something that now stank of beta wolf blood. Woojin would say he should have foreseen this before, but it was difficult to know when he himself - being only human - could not tell apart from one another unless he looked into their eyes. Alive, preferably. When he removed the wolf's head from the backseat, the smell was the only thing that gave Woojin the answer as to why he had been bitten rather than dead.

And this was by no means a good thing. Whether it was to be transformed, transformed by a beta, or having to deal with what the wolf himself had done in a very conscious way, thank you. Woojin knew that alphas didn't bite, for that matter, it was something that was learned early according to his own basic method. He also knew that the death of an alpha guaranteed the death of a pack in the short or long term. As part of the quarters, Woojin didn't have exactly the time to analyze the circumstances as he should. Whatever the consequences or what might come from it.

Honestly, he just wanted that to stop.

His head seemed to play in looping the last twenty years of drums of any Brazilian samba school, an elephant march, and a remake of lady marmalade, all in sequence or simultaneously. He knew that the fault wasn't exactly the lack of sleep, not really being able to feel any, or the fact of being under the sun when his hands could cook an egg only with the heat that emanated. Woojin had repressed his first full moon. Or at least what it was to have been the fine line between what he was before and what he is now; and he just didn't want to accept it for much more effective reasons than ethical or moral. If they discovered that he had been bitten, he might consider himself a dead man or a guinea pig for the government. Woojin hadn't yet crossed the demarcation of his sanity, but eventually it would happen and the second option would not even be cogitated.

From then on, his way was a double-edged knife. On the one hand, he might have given up the infirmary or the field missions - which he had already done on dozens of excuses - handing himself over to his commanders to live in a cage and studied by an unwanted condition, or he could simply see how everything that would end. Woojin had no family, he was very badly able to maintain relationships of any kind normally and would surprise him if anyone else really realized the gravity his thoughts were taking. Woojin had always thought he would die differently and was never really afraid of being ripped apart by a creature with at least the triple of his strength - but for some reason, it was disturbing to imagine that he could be killed by the hands of a human.

He turned his eyes to the street, listening from miles the first sound that had come to him since an interval of two hours. Too loud, as if it's buzzing at his ear, Woojin could have guessed that it was a bicycle with the broken breaks; and his bonus hunch came from the slipper crawling along in the asphalt as the child mounted tried to descend the street without crashing violently with whatever parked car. Woojin sighed, watching behind his glasses the same child twisting his nose about the blood that the water led straight into the curb, and that did nothing more than restart the same intrusive thoughts as before. Maybe just a little less this time.

 

"Good morning, Mr. Bang!" The boy shouted from the bicycle, waving at the figure across the street, black from head to toe and an exaggerated hat, which bore the vague remembrance of a _sombrero_ to Woojin. He stepped aside, only to plunge his own figure into the shadow of the garage and hope not to be seen by the same reference point between himself and the child. Not that it would be so hard.

"Good morning, Innie!" Waving back, Chan straightened his posture shortly thereafter and turned his ridiculously pale face toward Woojin, who avoided even breathing. Maybe if he kept quiet for long enough, it would all turn out well. "Good morning, Wooj." He blew out the air from his lungs, stunned. "I saw you."

"You can't see a thing..."

" _Metaphorically_ ," Chan explained, overtaking the other man's moodiness as he crossed the street toward him. He was a striking figure, almost grotesque, and Woojin couldn't get used to the idea of having him around now that he had moved into the front house. A very specific point for his luck, inclusive. "Had a restless night?" Chan cocked his head to the side, Woojin still silently trying not to feel his stomach turn into an unmentionable feeling as he stared directly into Chan's eyes. Whites, with no color at all to indicate that there was at any moment something there.

 

He took a deep breath. That had made enough noise to denounce his presence to anyone a few yards away. Chan wrinkled his nose.

 

"The last time we met you told me you were fine, but you're still injured." The diagnosis came untouched, but Woojin shifted one of his hands toward his own rib. Chan followed with his head, not necessarily with his eyes. They didn't see anything, after all. "You're smelling different too." Chan took two steps toward him, forcing Woojin to pull back at least one, lowering the hose to his feet and extending his forearm to keep the other from coming so close. As if it hadn't been enough before.

"Is it natural for your specie to be such an intruder?" He said visibly discontented, and Chan pulled away, almost as if he had been kicked out of the sidewalk. He crossed his arms.

"That was unnecessary." His voice didn't show, but Woojin knew he had been rude and Chan was overly sensitive. How he wanted to go back to thinking that vampires had always been emotionally controlled and cold. "Are not you going to invite me in?"

"After the tenth visit this week I didn't think I needed to." Woojin walked away, taking the water trail to the register, where he turned off the faucet. He abandoned everything that way, knowing that Chan would "feel" when he moved his arm indicating that he can go ahead. What were the chances of someone stealing an open car that stank of sweat, blood, and rust?

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

"So...who died?" Chan asked as he leaned his hips over the sink and lifted the mug with both hands to his face, seeming to absorb the metallic scent of artificial blood ironically placed on a mug written " _Donate!_ " in vivid red.

 

Woojin had difficulty remembering himself of the same enthusiasm in donating blood since he had met Chan.

 

"No one that I know yet." He averted the vampire's eyes, concentrating on the buttons of the radio that rested on the counter. Woojin was never tired of how all the things he had looked and was, in fact, old. Perhaps because of his little attachment to life - ignoring his need to live recently reborn compared to his two and a half decades living - he had never forced himself to replace anything left of his family. Not even themselves in any way. "I thought Jeongin was forbidden to talk to you."

"Oh, one question with another, smart."

"It wasn't a question, it was an observation." He straightened, watching for a few seconds the rosy tone Chan's lips acquired from the drink, which wouldn't last long. "Is he betraying his parents' confidence again?"

"It's not like I'm going to do him any harm." Woojin thought of a thousand ways to argue back, but he knew that he had already gotten too involved with things that didn't make him feel so much better to stand out, even if it was self-defense. He knew he was wrong the first time he dumped a thousand stereotypes upon Chan, trying to convince himself to go against all the characteristics of what humans considered inhuman. A bit ironic, stopping to think. Woojin now didn't know how to call himself, but for a long time he didn't feel human as he should be. "Besides, it was a harmless greeting."

"They can ask for a restraining order against you." Woojin pursed his lips, this time looking directly into Chan's eyes, even if all he saw was the emptiness staring back at him. Contradictory, still fuller than Woojin felt. "And you're going to have to move again."

"There are still plenty of places I'd like to go through." The vampire smiled, though the same smile didn't reach his eyes and look much more automatic than genuine. Woojin rested his elbow on the surface of the counter, closing his hand under his chin, waiting for what else to come. Meanwhile, the chosen station played anything Woojin didn't know the name of, but it didn't sound as sensitive to his hearing as almost everything around him. His head was exploding and he tried faithfully to ignore the feeling that soon his ears would begin to bleed if someone opened the door too hard in less than four kilometers. "Maybe I can get a place closer to work …"

"Bullshit, don't even have two weeks," Woojin cut sharply and impatiently, rolling his eyes. He wondered why he was getting so bad at dealing with things. "Just ... try to keep them from looking." Chan raised his eyebrows and Woojin gestured quickly. "You know, you may not see, but they have eagle eyes ..."

" _Holy Dracula._ " Chan threw back his head and dropped his own shoulders. "What the hell is wrong with you today?"

"I don't know," He answered honestly, clenching his teeth and bringing both hands to his face. He felt something stabbing his stomach, a sense of revolt against anything unspecified; or against absolutely everything, taking into account the mistakes made in record time and that wasn't his character. Woojin knew not. Although he was naturally rough, he was never purposely rude about something that no one had control of. "Bad day, I guess."

"I noticed." The vampire's bitter tone again made the anger rise in Woojin's throat, not knowing whether it was with himself or with the other, being partially split even with no clear reason, seeing that Chan wasn't wrong to feel uncomfortable there. He took a deep breath. Woojin followed the velvet steps of the other on the wood floor, circling the counter until he stopped right beside him - no heartbeat, no breath, no more than a disturbance in the air around him. Chan was the same as nothing in that environment. "Did something happen?"

 

 _A lot of things_ ; but he was fully aware that Chan didn't need to know. And shouldn't even. He was still a normal citizen even though the circumstances were less favorable to the vampire than it was for himself. From having to stand expectations of his nature to dealing with the sense of nonexistent threat humans still felt about him. Woojin didn't think anything was going to overcome that kind of exclusion until he came close to having to deal with something worse. Much worse.

He turned his body toward Chan, scrutinizing each of his features, every small gesture, without actually breaking his head to decipher any of them. And as much as Chan couldn't look back at him - and he had foolishly pointed out so many times that it was impossible to ignore the burden of guilt that was beginning to surface - Woojin knew that he was as focused on himself as the opposite.

 

"You're scared, aren't you?" Chan asked lower, still holding the mug with both hands, even though there was almost nothing else in it. There was no response. With a sigh, finally, Chan balanced the drink only on the right hand and guided the opposite perfectly to the oily hair of Woojin, running his fingers through the scalp before descending them to the nape of his neck, the other barely noticed his eyes closed. When he pulled away, Woojin raised his eyebrows, not moving more than that. "It's going to be okay." He heard the mug being left on the counter, his own heat still loosening in every movement of Chan's left hand. "Thanks for the drink."

 

Woojin only opened his eyes again when he heard the door close, and even though it was hard to consider Chan's a living presence, for the first time his absence seemed to have made a difference. He brought his hand to the cup, turning the opening toward himself. It wasn't unusual for him to leave so much behind.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I owe the chapter of another fanfic yet, let me explain why I updated this one before: I already had this chapter planned even if not all  
> I'm still not on vacation (help me baby jesus) so I still have college assignments until next week where I'm going to spend a month in another state. This is a very stressful time and I don't want to ruin a sci-fi story plot by writing it in a hurry  
> You have no idea how much I really work and dedicate myself to trying to give you the best content, writing is something I've been doing for years and telling stories is the way I have to not let my life end before the age of twenty-five at least.  
> If I'm late, I try to do things the best, but I apologize anyway. I am trying.
> 
> I have some ideas for this story, but I need your feedback. So comments are warmly welcomed and I want to hear what you have to tell me before I think I'm writing for the walls. Constructive criticism, ideas, theories, anything.
> 
> I hope you like it so far (and as for the mistakes, please correct me, I still don't know as much as I'd like to be confident about it 100%).


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "See, that's what made them agitated." Woojin raised his eyebrows, puzzled by Jisung's suggestion, following his gaze to his hands. "Looks like an infection, dude."

 

 

 

  **U** sually, Woojin didn't have to deal with counts. His most basic debts went into automatic, and his external bills weren't really considered as long as he had never experienced any money problems. He seriously avoided making it a hindrance. However, maybe now he needed a new car - a day earlier, still within a weekend of being spared his fieldwork, Woojin spent his beloved 24 hours trying to see if there was any salvation in the seats he tried to wash or on the carpet stained with blood. He tried to check the functionality of the brakes and motors; and from the outside, he stared at the scratch-and-dents carcass that he never thought was worth the effort to cover up.

The decision came fast. When he sold the car to the junkyard, the money received - not particularly much - remained in the sealed envelope on the nightstand in the room that he hadn't been in for two days. He wasn't sure what to do with that amount since it wasn't so high to replace his loss, but it wasn't so short that he couldn't, for example, opt for a motorcycle. All these thoughts were based on the premise that Woojin needed to get around, but far from anyone who had a cologne too strong to cause his nose to bleed for a few hours.

 

 

"For God," he murmured in a whisper, resting his hand on the pale lab table, tilting his torso forward as he watched the continuous drops of blood leave the curve of his upper lip toward the first surface in the path. Blindly, Woojin searched for anything with a similar texture of cloth or at least a rough napkin, eventually not caring much when all he found was a sheet of paper, which he didn't so carefully fold to support his nose bleed. He moved away, his hand now free from his brace trying to shrug off the white coat, which he definitely didn't want to have the responsibility of cleaning because of an accident.

 

Working with so many medicines and chemical derivatives also didn't seem to have a strong positive effect on Woojin's pipe. Even that day the process had been repeated three times, so as to cause discomfort in a specific department of the quarters, where Woojin wasn't always allowed to be around, but the opposite was valid. Vampires had some skills about werewolves, advantages that made Woojin happy as a worker, but not as one that bordered on the end of a forced-down pact. Mainly by recognizing his changes, how much they affected him with each passing second and how hard it was to lie to others when he was still lying to himself.

 

"I bet the taste is horrible."

 

Particularly, his good days seemed more and more distant. Woojin turned on his heel, but just enough for the corner of his vision to catch the mistress of the squeaky voice that had come to his ears like an annoying buzz and persistent feedback. He narrowed his eyes, avoiding any sudden movement, even though he knew it was irrelevant when he kept losing blood and felt the center of the paper a little thicker over the fingers that pressed it against his nose.

Of all the answers he could have given, Woojin opted for the one that went totally against that feeling of constant induced violence that commonly came from his insides clutching where it could: he decided to be silent, leaving his position just to go a little far away in the need to clean up the dirt he had caused again and hadn't learned to wait for it despite the other times. He felt overwhelmed, not by work, but by the number of problems that grew progressively and tended to multiply by a larger exponent with Soyeon's presence inside his office.

 

"Nice to see they're not giving you enough work to have to come and check on mine." He just couldn't keep up with that abstention for so long, knowing the vampire enough to believe she wouldn't leave just because he had chosen to pretend she didn't exist. Contrary to the sight of Soyeon's species, the one in which Woojin was-wasn't being inserted ended up bent, able to see even a strand of hair about to break from the middle to end, not far from the woman's jaw. This exaggerated perception just made it more complicated than he thought it needed to be.

"What did you see that was so exciting, _Doctor_?"

"Oh, you really don't want to know." He headed for the frosted glass cabinet, immediately resorting to the loose gauze of the packaging which in certain cases he would not use, but it was nothing serious to worry about at first. It was an external bleeding without obvious injury, Woojin had no way to stop if not wait without causing an even bigger mess. "I have peculiar tastes."

"I'm sure you have no inclination to masochism." Soyeon tilted his head, the movement of her long dark hair making Woojin feel like he was sinking into a dense ocean. As much as the air, asking for reverse passage to the blood still occupying his nose.

“You're absolutely right.” He was anxious for the conversation to end, opening his mouth made him feel the metallic taste coming from his throat. A feeling at least unpleasant. “But you, better than anyone, should know that we are different” He leaned back against the table, pushing the gauze out of his face only to avoid choking, regardless if it wasn't the most pleasurable sensation to breathe at the moment. "Unlike you, I really care about the idea of tasting my own blood."

 

Woojin didn't really need to intervene in anyone's personal life to recognize their habits - their medical records were still within their reach, apart from the fact that not all such "peculiar tastes" of co-workers were evidently discreet. Vampires were creatures a bit more useful in ways that humans couldn't get over, but they weren't that different. They were variable and more complex than one might admit, but for some reason, Woojin never really seemed to sympathize with the species - and if that was increasingly strongly expressed in his daily life, it was perhaps because he was extremely impulsive about his aggressiveness. And it was probably even redirected. In other circumstances, Woojin wouldn't use personal information to counter-attack a silly argument generated by a bad mood of his. Soyeon just had no luck finding him on a good day and probably with a better memory than usual.

 

“If you want, I can help you with that in two seconds—” Not at all, Woojin consciously meant to threaten a co-worker but had let it slip when he simply crumpled the gauze and let it go from his palm to the trash bin near to his feet, allowing for a more open interpretation when he not really initiating any further action. Not because he wasn't serious (and maybe that was his least favorite part), but because Jisung's clear presence in the room retracted any principle of his own long enough.

 

Although it was not healthy for his current condition to remain involved with anyone, he could kneel down and thank Jisung for stopping him from doing anything stupid that crossed his mind within a few seconds.

 

"Wow, troubles already?" Jisung asked in his usual hyperactive tone, probably further influenced by the large cup of coffee in one of his hands.

"Jisung, it's 4 pm" Woojin replied tiredly, redirecting one last look at Soyeon before she got the message, as much as the initial idea - perhaps on both sides - was to sort it out later. However, he had the impression that the later would never actually arrive. "What do you want?"

“The department 3 has been noise since after lunch.” As if noticing the woman's presence just then, Jisung raised his eyebrows and turned his whole body toward Soyeon, ignoring her bitter expression as if it were already characteristic of her. "What's going on?"

"Your friend has been bleeding since 11 am" Soyeon explained, the tone not unlike the distortion on her face. Rudeness by rudeness, Woojin could not really counter. "And honestly, you need healthy habits, your scent can be felt from the gate!"

“Before you ask, there's nothing wrong with me.” Woojin hurried to defend himself, even because Jisung was able to start a torrent of questions that he knew would eventually lead him to tell absolutely everything. He was unwilling to risk it because a large part of him didn't think he knew the other enough to cross that line. He had forced the bars enough last time. "Don't you really have any shadows to hide and crucifixes to avoid?" He joked, being pretty straightforward with Soyeon.

“Woojin -“

"Out, both of you." Woojin gestured tense, still with an unpleasant taste in his mouth that was no longer so connected to the beginning of the whole situation. Nor did Woojin let it go when Jisung assured Soyeon quietly that he would "settle," but he preferred to ignore until the point of his greatest annoyance had even left the room shortly thereafter, convinced that she would no longer have to face the nurse's strangely rude habits. "I thought I told you to leave, too." He concluded, just so that he wouldn't break the fact that he was able to keep up with everything from a considerable distance. It would be a shot in the foot itself and Woojin had already shot many in the last week.

“But I just arrived.” With a rather childish smile, Jisung approached leaving the cup next to Woojin with the excuse of an uncomfortable temperature for the palm of his hand. "So, what happened between you and Morticia?"

"I hope she can hear you."

 

Woojin moved to the well-positioned sink in the corner of the ward where he wiped the dried blood between his fingers, already starting to feel uncomfortable knowing that he could no longer control certain aspects of his transformation. The conversation with Chan still seemed very well etched in his memory and always replayed; like a perfume bottle no longer helped to prevent the intense glances from Department 3. He should have voted against it when they came up with the idea years ago.

 

"An accident, that's all." Which was still true, after all, he just didn't understand how his blood pressure was working too high for a healthy human. "Each passing day vampires become more sensitive to any crap."

 

Still slightly on his back, Woojin noticed Jisung shifting his weight from foot to foot, the coffee cup still untouched and now with extra attention from him as if he had something to say that he just didn't seem to want to spill. Woojin had a hunch, and if he was right about it, he really preferred Jisung to spend his time keeping quiet. He dried his hands rather sloppily, quickly checking his palms before returning to his corner of the table.

 

"See, that's what made them agitated." Woojin raised his eyebrows, puzzled by Jisung's suggestion, following his gaze to his hands. "Looks like an infection, man."

 

Unfortunately, Woojin was absolutely sure that wasn't exactly the problem. Looking better where the other's attention was, he came to the conclusion that it was something worse, a little more drastic than it seemed. Under normal circumstances, in fact, it seemed that the dark cuticles of at least three distinct nails were something to do with a fungus or a blow hard enough to cause a bruise - but he had cut his nails the day before and could already see them to an unhygienic size for the job he'd been willing to do. Even studied as he was, Woojin didn't know the step-by-step of his transformation and how little it would cost him to ignore every sign of it, so he felt his throat tighten as he realized that it would be much harder to hide the changes than imagined.

 

"Sure." He answered apathetically, still focused on the idea of perhaps having to start painting his nails. "What else could it be?"

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Woojin knew he played with luck too much - though he also thought he used more of the same resource needed to save him from situations he had created himself. None of them was a good reason to be proud of, by the way. It was obvious that in his high school days there were far more professions than this one in particular, where he was being played from sector to sector, even though it was far more useful in one than other. Woojin could have become any man-in-a-suit he had to deal with on public transport or bank lines. If that would be less of tension, he could only theorize that it would.

He had a lot to score about his lifestyle; not rustic, maybe just lazy. There his back was wet with the cold water of the shower he must have changed months ago, his feet relying on his own dry, brittle skin on his soles to stand on the frictionless floors. From a single-room perspective; there were still four left to count on his disorganization and precarious structure. The point was that Woojin no longer saw the reason for worrying about what he would eventually have to abandon. All he could know about the future that lay ahead was the certainty that the walls were closing more and more each day, leaving him without any viable alternatives to deal with the new situation.

He opened and closed his fingers, watching how the state of his nails seemed to have worsened overnight, with the dark hue dominating the rest of his fingers and being able to effortlessly observe the cracks it caused in its ever-increasing length long. Having _claws_ was definitely something other than a persistent absence of a decent manicurist. Woojin didn't know how long he could maintain his overall healthy appearance, considering that he hadn't even figured out how to mask a pseudo infection.

Nor was it much better to be aware of the huge scar on his ribs, burning with each new step that went nowhere. It was hard to recognize his own features, his own body, feeling trapped in something that was nothing of what it used to be. From the simplest in temperament to the most complex that required immense self-control so that Woojin just wouldn't get carried away. It was not socially acceptable to knock down doors and cut throats open (and he was still able to stay sane enough and consider that kind of bureaucracy extremely positive).

It was, likely that already aware of the whole process, not keeping mirrors at home would be beneficial - but it also turned out to be a tremendous loss of identity not being able to recognize himself in the distorted reflection of a teapot of the last century, stored in a wooden cabinet with the loose door. Woojin just didn't feel that he belonged, with every gesture guided by the automatic follow of life as it had always been; with few exceptions such as constant hunger, the recurring feeling of insanity and side effects physically spread throughout each cell.

He ran a hand through his wet hair as he left the box, then fastened the towel around his hip without long predicting that anyone was approaching the front door of his house - even though he heard the footsteps in that direction but at the same time he could hear a lot from all sides to deduce a specific point when he didn't have his focus on it. He only had time to put on his pants when he heard the knock, for a moment forgetting important details when he answered.

 

"Oh, good morning Woojin, I hope I'm not interrupting anything"

 

Not that she had much to interrupt. Woojin had gotten a day off after Department 3 complaints, promising that he would go to a doctor - which would not happen, but he had willingly accepted the time to think of a temporary solution. He didn't think this conversation was going too far either, after all Chaeyeon had never been a person who spoke far beyond what was necessary. At least not with him.

 

"No, you're not," he assured, straightening his posture even though he kept his body and hands automatically behind the door. "Can I help you?"

“Your correspondence” Woojin shifted his eyes to Chaeyeon's hands toward him, with some misgivings taking the small huddle of envelopes trapped between the woman's fingers, trying at all costs not to draw attention to his own nails (or he might start now calling them claws?) as he moved as quickly as possible.

"They ended up messing the address again ..." She pursed her lips, as if to say something else that strangely Woojin was being patient about. "Chaeryeong told me she heard some sounds last night -"

“What sounds?” He interrupted, already tenser than he would have liked.

"It must have been no big deal," Chaeyeon hastened to explain, a delicate smile on her face. “It looked like a dog was trying to get out the door… Did you finally decide to have a dog? I think it would be a good company ... ”

 

For a moment Woojin just didn't know what to say. Last night had been quiet and nothing was out of place - but since there were no wild animals within the walls of that house, the most obvious conclusion was definitely that he hoped no one had really linked one point to another to have it. He took a deep breath, half of the words that Chaeyeon had said to him didn't even pass for his ear in those seconds of reverie.

 

"No, I didn't get any dogs." Again he cut Chaeyeon's speech, this time more harshly and perhaps even rudely. He cleared his throat. "I was taking care of the dog of a friend, but he's gone," he blurted out without thinking too much, considering a compelling excuse. “Thanks for the letters, Chaeyeon, I'll report the error to the postman next time. Have a nice day."

 

He closed his eyes as he slammed the door, expecting to hear the footsteps pull back to open them again and situate what had actually happened. And if he hadn't decided not to move for the same amount of time, perhaps Woojin wouldn't have noticed the scratches near the doorknob, like sharp claws that, according to Chaeyeon, seemed to have tried to get out. He faced his own wrists and then his hands with a heavy sigh and unfocused eyes.

 

"I need help."

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yo!
> 
> What a difficult chapter to write, honestly. It's normal to take a long time in transitional chapters until things start moving around, so, for now, it's going to be pretty simple and I ask you for your patience - mainly because I know I take a long time to update things.
> 
> My sister got married last weekend and it was a mess because I was one of the bridesmaids and I had to deal with a lot as well. Anyway, the ideas for the next chapters are already brewing in my little head, but I don't know when I'll update again. We hope that to be soon.
> 
> As always: you can correct me if necessary and constructive comments and criticism are always welcome. I'd love to interact with y'all, but it's not just up to me.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed <3


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The same pair of eyes from years ago watching him back. And yet, they weren't the same. He feared they never would.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I came back before you could say "Bang Chan saved the kpop industry" ;D

 

 

 

 **H** e adjusted his sunglasses on his face, his arms folded trying to dismantle less of the discomfort he actually felt from being in an environment he hadn't frequented for over fifteen years. Woojin knew that the situation was still quite different, throught. He had grown up among children with rosy cheeks and warm hands, with the sight of an ant on a tree trunk a few inches away. That was at least weird, because vampire insertion into the present society was still recent and his five-year-old version had spent enough time thinking that each of those pale faces with sharp canines could actually do more than cause some dizziness and possibly some scratches on his neck.

Years later, the most dangerous figure in a field of blood suckers, ironically, was him. Not that he considered this inversion of values to be very positive, after all gradually Woojin was beginning to accept the burden that had been imposed upon him - not calling himself as one of them didn't make reality any less certain that he was.

Most vampires were unaware of their surroundings. Perhaps because they were led to believe what the system they were involved in showed, with tactical actions by groups such as Woojin's to rid them of problems masked by government interests. Not wanting to get the idea that Woojin didn't have werewolves as enemies either, he just disagreed that they were going to be favorable weapons for the quarters, when that, out of the eyes of top officials, no soldier really bothered to save any creature for absolutely nothing. And maybe it was that policy of shooting first and asking later that made sure that there was no one on the other side of the fence to look good - or to pose the threat as true. All that passed through the media filter were exactly figures of anthropomorphized animals already dead.

That explained why no reaction to his arrival in kindergarten was really explicitly alarming. He was absolutely sure that his presence bothered them because he had to deal with the result of his physical and hormonal changes before, but when none of them had a reference of why, Woojin was only a person of strange characteristics. Something different.

 

"Good afternoon, how can I help you?" The secretary asked, her eyes a little dry behind the lenses of her incredibly strong glasses. Woojin didn't even want to imagine how intense a woman's visual impairment should be. Her lips curved into a smile that couldn't reach her eyes and her nose wrinkled not so discreetly, her nostrils flared. Woojin sighed.

“Could I talk to Professor Bang, please” His throat was scratchy and his voice came out a little louder than it had been intended. He braced his forearms on the workbench, his hands clenched and away from the watchful eyes of the employee's analysis of a teacher's company. Justifiable, to be honest.

"He's still in class -"

"If you don't mind, it's urgent."

 

Lying wasn't the healthiest of habits, but it had been what convinced the secretary — after causing the woman a certain shake-up with what he suddenly improvised — to take him to the room at the end of the corridor, still on the first floor, whose the closed doors didn't drown out the sound of each class. Or, probably, it was Woojin's uncomfortably keen hearing that make he could hear their pencils and chairs rubbing on any surface. Whether with papers, wooden floorboards or well-polished children's leather shoes. The odor wasn't pleasant either, understanding his distortion of the environment. Vampires didn't usually exhale anything at all, but the same couldn't be said of school supplies and cleansers. Woojin raised his head and took a deep breath for a few seconds while walking; He didn't want to repeat the incident that forced him to take that 'day off'.

 

“Please wait here.” With no time to counter with a childish, provocative denial, he just watched her come into the room, interrupting the class 'politely' - she seemed to have her own ways - attracting the attention of the children who followed much more by sound than by other possible senses. All around four or five years, much quieter than an ordinary class would be. He needed to revise his vocabulary for specific situations (and rather that prejudice that was entrenched by something that he helped shape, conscious or not).

 

With the time he had available, Woojin tried to get as much detail as he could from the place he had been barred from, so all he could see was the space between the door jambs. The room was strangely clean; there were no colorful posters or letters in alphabetical order, as he well remembered in other schools. The blocks scattered over a rug made of EVA had only one base color, ranging from bright to faded red, while other toys seemed to boil down to the same effect. Or they were too dark in shades to be interesting to a human child, for example. Some of them had small queued volumes, tailored to the material of a particular piece, which Woojin believed to be Braille writing. The books on the shelf, if they had a different cover, were probably because it wasn't made for the kind of kids where teaching was redirected there.

Everything seemed out of place. Especially for those who would by no means fit into such an environment.

 

_"Thank you, Miss Kang"_

 

Woojin managed to focus enough on Chan's voice to understand the last words redirected to the secretary, just then really stopping to stare at the navy blue uniforms of the children behaving so calm in their proper place, concentrating himself on an uncomfortable teacher coming toward him with a diffused expression, perhaps a little conflicted about revealing how outraged he was at the interruption.

 

"Good afternoon, Professor Bang -" He could have continued, but the way Chan had leaned against the door, the sound of the lock sounding soft between them, forcing him to choose to cut off the rest of the words before they came out of control or the other took the initiative to shorten them.

“Did you say to her that my parents are dead?” Low, extremely low, but still tamed by rush. Each syllable dripped Chan's classic expressionism. "Woojin, I have no parents!"

"Too bad she doesn't know that, does she?" He rolled his eyes, uncrossing his arms.

“What did you come to do here? Why you couldn't have called, waited, anything -"

“I didn't lie when I said it was important.” Even though he couldn't exactly say his motives, he knew Chan would understand that not everything could or should be shared; Woojin really considered that a 'life or death' case. He probably was just unable to put the necessary seriousness into the matter at that moment. He wasn't in control of his own abilities, putting it in a much less desperate way than he felt. "I need you to tell me where I can find Seungmin."

 

Silence was Woojin's last concern - though the sooner he received the answer to his demand, the better it would be. Seungmin was a banned subject between them and perhaps the mere mention of his name already made Chan aware of the scale of the problem, whatever it was.

The decision to isolate himself had been entirely his. When Seungmin left town, on his own convictions, Woojin may have been the one who most tried to repair his absence in the ways he could. Not that it made a difference, in one way or another. He had never been as good at replacing others as they seemed to be with him and he was never really willing to charge for getting back everything he had ever given. Sometimes he even preferred a relationship where there was no reciprocity - everything seemed a lot safer when he didn't set too much expectations about it. However, recently observed by more people than he was proud to realize, all that bitterness he kept for years behind a peaceful facade gradually left his chest in much more aggressive ways than if he had simply tried to talk about them long before. Seungmin's absence was still heavy and he had never noticed how much it bothered him to say his name until his tongue curled and the inside of his cheeks were punished by his unconscious gesture of martyrdom for what wasn't under his control.

Since things got out of hand, he preferred that the other's whereabouts was a secret to himself. He promised that he wouldn't look for him and would not involve him in anything he wasn't really willing. It was his fault that Seungmin had left the city - it had been him putting a sign on his back, it had been him making him a target, all for a stupid desire for acceptance in an environment that today crushed his lungs and choked him without any positive motives. If things went according to plan, maybe he should start with an apology before demanding any favors.

 

“Are you sure?” Chan seemed to have a similar line of reasoning, or at least his same hesitation was evident. The vampire had never rejected a request from Woojin for the imagined debt he thought he had with the soldier, but Seungmin had also made him promise that seeking him again would require overriding rules. Woojin clearly should have been breaking a good deal of them just by resorting to someone who had never told him no.

"I wouldn't have come here if it was just guilt-induced," He admitted, the sharp tone making him regress as soon as he noticed the other automatically shrug. "I need his help, Chan."

“Why?” The noises of the vampire anxiously moistening his lips and fingernails scraping the fabric of his own clothes sounded too loud in Woojin's ears. "Wooj, what is going on?"

“Noth –“

“Don't insult my intelligence.” Chan cut off immediately, but with no feelings in his voice that didn't incite his concern. Woojin felt even more guilty each time, forcing him to suppress every negative feeling he could no longer contain; and that irritated him, feeding what that curse had created. "You haven't touched his name in the last few years, but suddenly you start acting weird and see in him a solution that can probably be found in other ways."

"Chan, please."

"Tell me" He begged "Tell me why your smell is not the same, why you act aggressively at every opportunity, why you came here to deconcentrate me when I finally managed to stop thinking about the insults you did to me a few days ago."

“I'm sorry, okay?” He raised his hands, a clear signal for Chan to stop before there was a need to interrupt him even more harshly than he'd ever treated him before. Woojin didn't want to get into that merit, didn't want to let go of the line of his self-control and hear what his subconscious whispered at his ear. _Weak, too sensitive._ “I told you it wasn't a good day, what do you want me to do? I'm already sorry, I can't go back with what happened. ”

 

There was so much more to that request than it actually appeared. Woojin wasn't just referring to how he treated an entire species that was by his side in the past. It wasn't as if he was betraying his ideas completely - just because he knew that his surroundings sounded like a jumble of bullshit. The policies he once trusted and would give his life over now might want him for absolutely nothing. The curtains had fallen, and now he realized he worth so little because he was no longer in the species above all others. He was no longer part of a privileged caste because they were nothing but clever - not really strong as they thought. Woojin was filled with an ineffable sense of rage destined nowhere and at the same time for all of them.

That silence alone could be considered a violence on both sides in its aforementioned ways.

 

"He's on the border of the city." Chan crossed his arms, his face turned to the ground, the tip of one foot moving slightly toward Woojin. "But I won't say where unless you take me with you."

“No –“

"Great, then I'll come back to the class and you make your way for yourself." The answer had come out almost blustered, a strong childlike tone even though apparently it wasn't the vampire's goal, automatically being disappointed by his own attitude. After a deep breath and the indication that he was serious as he stepped back, Woojin reached out, holding Chan by the wrist a little more tightly than he would like to stop him from going too far. "Let me go."

"Ok, I'll take you with me."

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

The deal had been simple: Chan would not get in, nor would he leave the car no matter how far Woojin would park from the gps-marked residence. Under the same excuse given at the elementary school office, they left the place as the sun began to set, the silence all the way down not really uncomfortable but far from keeping both companies truly meaningful to each other. Woojin felt as if he had done something extremely wrong in searching for the vampire, who in turn hadn't shown much improvement in his mood from the last words exchanged in private until that moment.

The eyes on the road all the time and the hands attached to the wheel don't diminish a strange desire that Woojin had to just put the same hands on Chan's shoulders and shake him until he let go all that feeling that everything was out of place. Wrong, incorrect, imperfect, unreal. No matter how he wanted to name that moment, they would all take him to the starting point - Woojin continued, no longer consciously, to put himself in a position where he didn't belong. He refused to bow his head to fate, refused to assume the consequences of his choices. Sometimes, he found himself thinking about the weight that would have disappeared if he had moved a street to the direction he was walking that day and so many others before, responsible for such drastic changes. He could not, however, fail to consider the other side of the coin, where he would also have to wonder which others would come in for him.

Woojin could have died so many times. He could have used that opportunity to redeem himself - even with those who had left long before. He could have done his best. He could have charged less, he could have given up of ethical and moral problems that were insanely fueled by an unnatural destructive instinct. Woojin was still scheduled to die. Maybe now with the fresh ink of the target hanging between his eyes it was easier to see how little he worth. And again, those thoughts didn't limit him to harmless yet negative feelings. All he could feel was anger. Pure and insane anger.

He took a deep breath, slamming on the brake with a little more impact than necessary, causing the car - which wasn't his own, it was worth mentioning - to react accordingly, with Chan extending one hand toward the dashboard while the other remained reassuring that the belt was fastened. Despite the pain in his elbows from the impact of physics, Woojin didn't even move.

 

“Do you want to kill us?” Woojin blinked slowly, tilting his head to the side and resting his arm on the lowered window, trying to find the number indicated by the GPS's electronic voice, that insisted it was still a few feet away. All right, he was so far away that he knew Chan wouldn't listen if he couldn't hear much himself. Even to a deserted place where a needle on the road could resonate in his brain for days. “Woojin!”

"Sorry," he said, completely ignoring his subconscious insisting that killing the vampire by his side required far less. Woojin, by no means, wanted to think that about anyone. The bitterness in his mouth came with the idea that those intrusive thoughts, now so common, made him feel depersonalized. "Are you alright?" He shifted the subject, turning to Chan, who still stood with his face facing forward and his chest rising and falling at an abnormal speed for who, basically, almost never even seemed to be alive.

"No." Chan slid his hip a little over the seat, his legs noticeably weaker and his eyes now closed. "When you try to kill yourself again, please, don't put me into this.”

"You asked to come." The defensive was stupid, but he persisted. "I will try to be quick, but even if I don't, don't leave the car."

 

He didn't expect an angry response or indignation from the vampire; not that they were known to keep their word, but Chan took their agreements to the letter, so Woojin managed to catch just an apathetic snort of the other before he finished closing the door. He turned his face upward, the sky filled with gray clouds and a barely visible moon, enough to know that the road had been long. Probably more than two hours.

He had no plans, in fact. Woojin hadn't really thought about how to start the subject, nor what it would be like to meet Seungmin again - it had never really been an option to resume ties with the aforementioned simply because there were no reasons. When he had made it clear that he didn't want to see him, Woojin didn't dare to go against his wishes. Even questioned. He didn't make him stay, didn't persist. If that was what he really wanted, he failed one of several attempts to be empathic, even if he crossed the line of importance with freedom. So faint.

 

_66 D._

 

Woojin could see that one of the letters had been torn off and that the walls looked as if they had recently been broken - or that it was possible for such a strong structure to be damaged to the point of showing such long cracks in the facade. He didn't feel comfortable. As much as the cream-brick walls were so receptive, just like the roses in the completely sealed window, it was still not an extremely familiar environment. Everything was well taken care of, of course, but the light passing under the door plus the absence of any residential noise never really had any good indications for Woojin. Even more so, where being less than two steps from the door not being able to hear a single presence was indeed... strange. Desperate. Agonizing.

He took a deep breath, his lungs aching from the frequency of such an attitude, taking longer than necessary to decide to hit. Nothing came from any direction. There wasn't the sound of an ant at all. No crickets and flies. No stray cats and...

Woojin pressed his nails against his palms, his heart starting to pump more blood than necessary - and more than it 'normally' did. The doorknob turned, still not making a single sound with the sensation of having himself deaf before everything came as an avalanche. He retreated a considerable number of steps, not even concentrating on the figure standing beside the doorframe before putting his hands to his ears, muffling his palms with everything that might affect him. His eardrums ached and gradually he felt the space between his fingers moist, slimy.

Woojin was absolutely sure he was bleeding. Damn it.

 

“ _Wo....I...N”_

 

Over TV squeaks, shattered glass, and a strange static without a specific direction, Woojin could still hear his name being dissipated through the air, but couldn't necessarily focus on much. Not when it felt like having a needle puncturing his brain persistently. Nor could he counter the invasive touch on his torso, hands gripping him beneath his arms and unresistingly dragging him wherever they went, scrath his shoes along the paved path.

And when it all stopped, Woojin raised his eyelids, staring at the bare feet, with decorated with various scratches, until he came up to find the same pair of eyes from years ago watching him back. And yet, they weren't the same. He feared they never would.

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not wanting to promise, but the chapters are likely to start getting bigger. This would be even bigger if I hadn't made the decision to cut since it would end up tiring for me to translate. I am really inspired with this story and I intend to take it as I can. 
> 
> As always, corrections, comments and constructive criticism are always welcome <3
> 
> p.s.: btw, view on 3YE's OOMM, it's amazing!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Woojin knew that he was the cause of this and was partly proud of that - but he tended to believe that this feeling wasn't his own. He was never really proud of hurting anyone, not even himself. Seungmin was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 

 

 

  " **S** trangely, I expected more from you."

 

Woojin pushed the tissues away from his jaw, each time he brought them into his sight noticing them thicker with all the blood that had damaged his hearing for long minutes - and he still couldn't hear that well to make up for the last few days, where he was able to point perhaps even the movement of atoms. The voice redirected to him, though a little more than two palms away, sounded so far and with a constant, persistent, annoying noise, like a poorly closed faucet in a completely silent environment. Woojin took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment, trying again not to give in to the pain that was still present, though with considerably reduced intensity.

He grunted, probably not consciously.

 

"Whether for being off guard or being ... well, not what I expected now."

 

He wanted to ask what exactly Seungmin meant by that, but Woojin wasn't stupid and anything that had been left between the lines of that sentence was effortlessly understood by context. Besides, it was really better that he hadn't said them, after all, it wasn't Woojin's favorite topic. Soldiers have always been taught to be selfish when necessary, to leave a mate behind without remorse when there was no way to save them. The concern was always with his own skin and it was evident how much that had always been the blind guide in the decisions he made. It was his isolation, his neutrality in the face of specific aspects that once almost set fire to Seungmin. Not by his hands, but it's still burning by what he was afraid to try to contain.

While he wasn't punctuating what he believed to be embossed in bold letters on his forehead, Woojin was also disappointed with the present - and the past, considering how much time has passed since the event. He didn't know how to answer why the breach of expectations about every tactic he had trained to execute perfectly and yet failed. Maybe it was the same low guard that made him over reliable that a warlock would never protect himself from what had so often nearly killed him. His innocence, of course, has always been the problem.

 

“You're not here just to visit, right?” Seungmin didn't seem to expect an answer with all the necessary short, thick words on Woojin's part. Although he had always been clear in his intentions, he understood that it might be complicated to express such a reversal of a reality already established so many years ago. "But before you say anything, I don't want your apology."

"Thanks, it saved me time." He replied a little bitterly, perhaps in a louder than usual tone, but Seungmin didn't scold him for it.

“When did it happen?” Woojin raised his eyebrows and Seungmin pointed to his own ear, passing the message indirectly. Woojin had been caught in a wolf trap, of course there was nothing to be denied, even because he needed the warlock's help.

"Three or four weeks, I don't know."

"You didn't go through the full moon, did you?"

 

The feeling of a doctor's appointment didn't please Woojin at all. Seungmin knew exactly what questions to ask without really having so much information, and it was impossible for the other not to feel relatively exposed to the almost unconscious examination the warlock was making without his full consent. He sighed tiredly, knowing it was just a necessary situation and not something that would eventually hurt him. Or he hoped that Seungmin wasn't the type to carry any bitter desire for revenge when Woojin had never really acted in bad faith - but mistakes weren't always something that was fixed with trivial excuses and sincere guilt-handling problems.

 

"No."

"You will. Soon. ” He concluded, rising up so that the trousers bar easily covered his feet with such light fabric. Woojin decided not to ask how, for someone who hadn't seemed to see sunlight for some time, Seungmin could have his heels and soles so badly hurt. "And the more you try to stop it, the worse it will be."

"What you mean?"

“Taming dogs is one thing, taming wolves is another, but humans are indomitable.” Seungmin seemed to pour something into a well-decorated cup, by the tea kit set on the kitchen countertop still under Woojin's field of view, sitting on the sofa not too far. The place was too small to support many rooms, so it was a practical sight. “Mixing any of the three elements creates an imbalance. Werewolves have an aggressive essence that is submissive to their nature, usually an unconscious trait that humans add to impulsivity. Everyone has been a victim of this at some point. ”

"Does that mean …"

"You can't change what has already happened." The warlock interrupted him, returning to sit casually on the coffee table and extend the cup to Woojin.

"I was hoping you could control it."

“I can't interfere with what the Fates programmed, just advance or reduce, never create and destroy.” Woojin stood staring at the cup resting on his one clean hand, the slightly bluish liquid making him stare back at his reflection. Surely he could cite historic shipwrecks that did better in that regard. "I am no God." Seungmin went on. "But I can help, yeah."

“One minute.” The soldier straightened, having not even approached the drink from his face before return the cup to the table, right next to Seungmin's hip and not bothering to be too delicate in the gesture. Everything still seemed a bit confusing to Woojin. Not necessarily what Seungmin had pointed out about the indomitable nature of that curse, in fact, his doubts were in no way really related to his present condition even though he had traversed the whole city precisely to resolve it. Something seemed out of place as if it were no longer messy enough by itself. "Are you offering me help with nothing in return?"

"I never said I wouldn't ask for anything in return."

"Ah, there is the catch ..."

"You didn't really expect things to be really that easy, did you?" Woojin sighed, sliding his back down the upholstered furniture uncomfortably hotter than his own skin, his hands slightly aching for no apparent reason.

_Innocence, Innocence, Innocence._

 

"I didn't even expect you to let me in." He admitted, the octaves thrown down making the voice deeper and consequently whispered. There would always be that palpable tension between them, now intensified by the reversal of victim and executioner roles. Beneath Seungmin's latest tone, Woojin could define very well what wasn't said by what he believed to involve purely education: Seungmin could denounce him, as he himself had done against the warlock years ago.

“I don't want you to go through what I went.” As if he had managed to trace Woojin's thoughts well by his expression, Seungmin continued, still pathetically calm. "Because what is a bonfire close to years of possible physical and psychological torture."

"You're not making anything better."

“I don't want to make your conscience any lighter, every step that has brought you here was up to you, take the consequences.”

 

 _Karma never lies._ Woojin had overheard that discourse by the same person that left so much between the lines and was unfortunately capable of decoding each accusation without a problem. It infuriated him, but he was at a disadvantage if he wanted to give in to that instinctive, not intuitive aggression. Seungmin was his only recourse, if not to end the curse, at least to slow it down. Right?

 

“You'll have to leave everything behind at some point. It seems to me that you had accepted it well.”

 

He shifted his eyes from the ceiling to the warlock, his eyebrows raised behind his dark hair, making it clear that acceptance, in this case, didn't mean anything precisely positive. Nothing in that circumstance was to any degree comfortable. And embracing the idea that he would disappear from everyone's life at some point crossed a fine line between freedom and loneliness. Or maybe the cut went deeper into a wound that hadn't completely closed. Woojin knew that embracing the facts and abandoning the arguments didn't mean optimism or any kind of spiritual elevation that Seungmin seemed to be trying to express.

 

“You are as transparent as a piece of plastic, it's ridiculous.” Again Seungmin took the lead, reaching over Woojin's hand so that he would slowly undo the pressure of the lightly long nails crushed in his palms. "How do you think you're doing in hiding it so far?"

"Better than expected," he admitted earnestly, opening his fingers that creaked internally with each movement.

"Your anger is what limits your pain, if you don't let it out, one thing transfers the intensity to another."

“Do I need to hurt someone to keep them from hurting me? This is stupid."

"Isn't that what you've been doing for years?"

“You're right, I didn't come to visit and that includes sitting listening to you criticize me for the bad decisions I made.” Perhaps a little rougher than was actually necessary, Woojin used his opposite hand to push Seungmin's still away by one of his wrists. "I can't turn into a monster, Seungmin."

“Bad news then, you are already one.” This time the bitterness and hurt of an unresolved story were evident and Woojin took a deep breath, feeling his insides twist in extremely violent ways, making him nauseous, causing him to automatically started to sweat cold. "Nothing you try to do will stop you from killing one by one of those you say you like, if it wasn't a problem for you handing over their neck before, why would it be now?"

 

He managed to grasp with a growl of laughter the intentions of every word Seungmin said, aware that they weren't open-mouthed, but officially they had far fewer feelings than they showed. Still, they were inevitably a big deal to Woojin at that moment. That _thing_ , unable to name it otherwise, felt more and more vulnerable, exposed, betrayed. His ego had become something larger than his wisdom, and his full consciousness gradually melted, completely blinding his judgment. But he was still there, holding on not to hurt the part of his past that had already been hurt enough. An increasingly worn tie.

 

"You better stop," Woojin suggested, his torso slightly bent as his forearm was supported on his bent leg. He pulled his hand away from Seungmin's, retracting it safely to his own face, pinching the space between his eyebrows. "You don't want my apologies, okay, I get it, so stop demanding that I take the blame even more than I'm already doing."

"I won't forgive you for what you did to me." Woojin didn't look straight at Seungmin, not for lack of courage. It was as if the weight of his own murky thoughts still didn't allow him to pay as much attention to the course of the conversation as he would have liked. “They tried to set me on fire. It took me years to get my feet to heal. I lost my coven because you were selfish and still are, but now with an excuse.” The warlock clenched his teeth, for the first time in the conversation seeming to have lost his posture for seconds. “You sold me and have the courage to come here and ask me not to do the same to you for free. You must think I'm really stupid. ”

 

With what he could keep up with, Woojin noticed Seungmin get up, but didn't let him go too far when he mirrored his attitude and placed him between his body and the coffee table. It wasn't that difficult to escape from this situation, if it weren't for the context, it would be nothing more than a coincidence - but Woojin was big enough that at the moment it actually seemed a threat to anyone.

 

“And what really stops you? I know it's not benevolence. ” Indomitable, his words drifted down the tip of his tongue like an acidic cascade and his heart raced even faster than it had for the past few weeks. "You know if they come after me because of you, I'm not going to hell alone," he growled, giving in to the moment as he gripped the warlock by the collar of his shirt aggressively, barely causing Seungmin to lose his balance when he forced the other to be on his tiptoe to come face-to-face. "I take you by their hands or mine."

 

Not that he expected any equally violent reaction, panic in the eyes of those who were no longer afraid to die as he was the first time. Woojin knew that he was the cause of this and was partly proud of that - but he tended to believe that this feeling wasn't his own. He was never really proud of hurting anyone, not even himself. Seungmin was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

_This is not me._

 

“Your eyes.” Seungmin broke the silence after a while, turning his heels to the ground as Woojin loosened his grip, his confused expression followed by a few bewildered movements of his own body in reflex.

 

Without explaining, Seungmin walked away, catching something bright quickly, out of Woojin's field of vision, not giving time to the soldier to even think before his palm began to burn, the edges of a newly opened cut turning to ashes as his blood ran down his fingers.

 

“Don't blink too much.” Woojin moved his head to the side, catching the wet floor at his feet as Seungmin set the once-abandoned cup below his wrist and his hand tightened on his forearm, sinking his short, broken nails lightly against his skin.

 

 

He felt dizzy, the ringing already present in his ears becoming clearer, though still in incomprehensible words in a voice he didn't know. _Unite, unite_ ; it whispered. No connection at all. Woojin was absolutely sure he didn't even know if this was a language, only that he understood it.

_Kill. Them. All._

He jerked back reflexively, the cut on his thin skin seeming to burn with a little more intensity as he frowned and held the opposite hand between his fingers. He pressed one palm into the other, the stinging with every second less worse - Woojin didn't even think it might have made a scar since it wouldn't be the first or last.

 

"What the hell was that?" He asked, moving away from the warlock without realizing that Seungmin's unsteady eyes followed him without moving his own body. Then, still unresponsive, he just returned his attention to the cup, moving it in a circular manner.

"You have one more full moon until it corrupts you without your control," Seungmin warned almost automatically, listlessly. “He wants you to kill them all. One by one. He wants you to take revenge on what he lost, he wants you to take control back. You're one of them now, the only one left. ” Woojin remained silent, watching the scribbled runes on Seungmin's arms change shape, unsure if it was his own or some effect of what had just happened. "Your job is to go after them one by one, form another pack." The warlock sighed, lowering his wrist as he seemed to have finally left that strange thirst to cross the divided room again into the kitchen, turning the tap on over the soaked cup with blood that Woojin still had on his hands. "He wants you to continue what you kept him from doing."

 

It was simple - or Woojin imagined that it was if he had to think from the point of view of that part of him that he didn't know and that each day was gaining more strength and devouring what he always believed to be. A situation metaphorically nothing new, but in practice, it had brutally distant effects from each other. Wolves didn't transform unless the demand was extreme, right? An alpha wouldn't add to his pack more than he was willing to maintain and protect, which explained a predominance of small, easily decipherable packs around; modesty apart. That beta, whose the head remained in the trunk when Woojin sent the car to the junkyard, had lost the structure in which he had been molded and miraculously emerged alive from what Seungmin had implied that was an irreparable massacre.

Woojin didn't want to, but for a few seconds he felt completely empathetic about the cause of those who had completely ruined his life.

 

"Want something to drink?" Seungmin asked, placing the cup back on the counter.

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

He had no idea how much time had passed. Maybe more than three hours, but definitely something beyond sixty minutes since all the knowledge past and pre-fights exchanged with Seungmin couldn't have lasted less than that. Woojin felt numb. His steps to the car on the deserted street were slower on the way back than they had been on the way out — for completely understandable reasons, he felt drained in many ways. It wasn't uncommon this desire to simply lay the body where it was within reach, only wanting that whole wave of emotional intensity to pass. It wasn't just one thing to deal with at a time, but a tide of confusing sensations that weighed from the toes to the last hair follicle on his head.

He faced the bandaged hand, in which Seungmin had made a strange matter of caring despite Woojin's denial, moving his fingers with some difficulty, feeling his stiff joints and burning wrist. His heart hadn't yet calmed at all this mess of information. Woojin needed to start a pack - though he didn't want to and wasn't exactly sure if he should take it seriously - and in that way, abandon any micro-empathy line that bound him to any human, even if he doesn't have anything very strong holding him close to defending that race that if knew one of his secrets would unhesitatingly try to kill him.

His confusion could no longer be more obvious. Woojin felt as if something had been shattered inside him, broken up, destroyed, a strange calmness pouring through his system with hints of anger. He was no less annoyed by it, probably just more complacent with the aggressiveness that had been so visibly expressed that time that he was fully aware that a little more and the blood on his hands would not be his own.

He avoided thinking that things were no longer the same. How could they be? Because of him, he had left the house of an old acquaintance with the suspicion that he had done nothing but give him a new problem, although he didn't know exactly what it was about - all that story about reviving a pack for revenge, it would all be a suicide mission for Woojin; even if he was so used to them, always going to the field with chest tightness and a weight on his back that wasn't really about leaving something behind but about never had anything to really cling to.

And then he stopped, just for a few seconds, when he could get a better view of the car parked on the curb, aware that he might not be the most experienced person on goalposts. Inside, Chan had his head on the seat a little more tilted, his face turned to the window for no understandable reason for Woojin - but this time he wasn't really going to focus on what he had been highlighting quite often, even though he had already known him years before with the same condition. It needed no keen sense for the soldier to understand the vampire's anxiety; after all, it wasn't as if he had had time to efficiently get rid of the smell the blood left on the new bandages on his hand or near his earlobe.

Woojin always thought he never had anyone to go back to, even when Chan was always around.

He opened the car door, receiving a calm and somewhat slow response from his company that didn't exactly turn to his figure or did more than shift the position of his hands on his lap unconsciously facing him. Woojin followed for a few seconds, still standing, as Chan closed his fingers over the fabric of his twill pants, kneading it even more self-consciously. He sat, slamming the door and letting the silence extend as long as either thought it necessary to keep it.

Imperative enough to understand that much had yet to be said.

 

"You're bleeding," Chan noted without difficulty, looking uncomfortable with the silence when Woojin hadn't made any point of starting the car again, having remained sunk in the seat with the feel of an anvil on his chest and a void in his hands.

"Not for a while," he answered, his voice hoarse as if he hadn't used it for the past few hours. Woojin looked up, staring directly into the reflection in the mirror where the irises themselves looked like sapphires torn in half, directly connected to that burning sensation in his stomach and running down his torso, his arms, every inch of his body linked to a very hyperstimulating feeling. In that daydream, understanding part of Seungmin's reactions to that same aspect, Woojin didn't realize Chan's movement to his right until the vampire's hand reached his chin, seeming to leave a cold burn where his fingertips pressed.

“You smell blood whenever we're close lately.” Woojin could hear the vampire's lower voice at his ear, his thumb trailing lightly along the final outline of his jaw. He was analyzing him the way he could. "I didn't remember that you could lose so much since you joined the quarters.”

 

He knew the subject here was how many bruises Woojin had been accumulating recently, but he couldn't ignore the weight of Chan's last unspecified words. When he added to his justifications that he had nothing to lose was precisely because his decisions led him to lose everything; and as Seungmin had pointed out with some efficiency, Woojin never did anything to maintain them as they began to drip down his fingers and disappear at his feet. That was when his parents left, that was when his grandfather breathed his last. The fastest ascension decision was never the best one — especially when he demanded that he give up what little remained in that tide of events.

And again he was trying desperately to cling to anything that kept him alive, even though his greatest support didn't even seem to exist for most of his senses.

 

"Looks like it was bad," Chan whispered one last time, noticing Woojin's tension in his touch.

“It hurts like hell,” he concluded in a similar tone, placing his uninjured palm over the resting hand on his cheek. But Woojin didn't push him away, as Chan hoped he would. He just turned his face, resting his temple on the seat, locking his eyes on the vampire's as close as he had ever been. And he didn't care, simply because Chan had always struck him as a strange dream, the weight of something he didn't know. It was as if any stronger wind could make him disappear.

"Then why go on?" Woojin laughed quietly, finally pushing the vampire away by the wrist, even though he didn't actually let him go. There was so much analogy within so little. His breathing was heavy and his heart racing, though there was nothing staring back at him, Woojin knew he had nowhere to run. He wouldn't say it in words, but Chan knew. He always knew. "Hm," he murmured, for a moment both not brave enough to break that silent communication, even if it was necessary. _"I don't know you anymore."_

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello beautiful people, how are you doing? I'm fine :D
> 
> I wrote a good part of this chapter under the influence of some medicines because my health is questionable, not worrying, so I may have some errors in the text that I didn't even see, even if I was reading again and again. 
> 
> As usual, if you find anything, let me know. If you got confused, let me know. I am trying to avoid too many holes in the story or getting it too complex at some points.
> 
> Comments and constructive criticism are welcome, I like to talk if you have theories. Come without fear ;)
> 
> Remember: drink water, pet the animals and give views in double knot and wonderland <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You've been spying me?" 
> 
> "N-No, no, that's not it." Jisung cleared his throat, gesturing like a puppet doll in all directions. “The old men told me to change things while you were gone, it's not my fault.”
> 
> "But you shouldn't open a folder if it's not yours, Jisung."

 

 

 

 **H** e ran his fingers lightly over his neck, seeming to try to find something there, no matter how much he eventually stroked his numb and hopelessly cold skin. He swallowed hard, feeling his Adam's apple move up and down, but didn't seek to stop the movement. What was missing, there was no way to realize the absence. It had always been that clean, pale, empty way. Pure as the heavens to some, dead as the depths of hell to others. Chan never really stopped to think about the effect that having nothing to pulse inside could cause, socially speaking. He wasn't too different for not having blood running so intensely visible through his wrists - and even though it all seemed strangely stagnant, Chan still knew that inside wasn't really much distinguished from anyone else. He was still a jumble of flesh, bones and blood, just a little more resilient and stable than most humans.

And regardless of his brief certainty, it wasn't exactly lasting. He hesitated whenever he stopped to think about how fragile everything was, and how not having a vein vibrating beneath his fingers at his neck meant absolutely nothing and yet addressed to absolutely everything - because what he didn't have in abundance he sought in others. What he never had a chance to feel run through his body, run through the others and he was always anxious to hear just a heartbeat pretending to be his own. Not that he didn't have a heart, maybe at some point the thought had crossed his mind, but what hurt him wasn't just the agony that suppressed the nothingness in his chest. He knew it didn't just come from what his brain identified as sensations or feelings either.

He had always been undeniably more sensitive, or perhaps he was only in that situation to try to balance what was slowly crumbling, a construction that he should have anticipated not being so well structured. Chan never thought he had any use but to do good to anyone, the way he could, ignoring the whole nature of the tales of centuries ago where he would be seen as the opposite of what he was trying to pass. In part, he was grateful that he hadn't become what they expected of him, and that someone along his way had reached out to him - and now he was only trying to repay, no matter how far it sounded that the journey ended nowhere. For the first time, he didn't know exactly what he was doing.

At times when the light seemed too dim to fulfill its only illuminating function, Chan prayed. For the first and the last. He let his worries undress him and his shoulders no longer carry so much weight for things he couldn't change - and everything was constantly changing, so that in certain cases he could only hope. This wasn't the worst of times. Chan might not have had so many years to classify what went on as a war-time sensation dictated by Dracul's book, which he carried faithfully under his arm or usually near his chest. The small copy with thick leather cape had helped him several times, always tucked away under his too-frilly shirts. He believed he wasn't alone, not how he really felt.

That particular day, he prayed with a name in mind. Even though he couldn't see the savior of his kind, his head was squarely focused on the image that he knew to occupy much of an altar full of small details; but he couldn't identify them entirely by such less physical senses and only being able to hear his melancholy clink when the wind passed through the huge wooden doors. Even standing, he felt his knees go flat and his tense hands gave the impression that there were no larger dimensions. His whole body was jelly, his muscles lighter and his skin softer.

It was always the same thing. Chan felt lonely, but it wasn't exactly unusual for him to be isolated. He knew he wasn't the only one, and as much as he shouldn't, it was a consolation to acknowledge that fact — but his demons were different, and he doubted very much that anyone would even come close to what he was trying to deal with, exactly what he expected to have from his faith. He really didn't have anything else to turn to. He didn't have an outside voice that he could trust the new information. At some point, Chan remembered that he was the "new" thing in the midst of forged human normality. He was always in the position of the unknown and not the one who needed to face it.

He bowed his head, his strangely rough fingers scratching the surface of the silver necklace, whose end bore a pendant in the shape unknown to those who weren't interested in really knowing what Vlad's word was about. He slid his thumb again over each specific end of the molded design, a triangle, a vertical line, and two parallel horizontal ones. He gave to the nothing a small smile. There was no magic formula for everything, no matter how much he had witnessed the various ways in which magic showed itself to those who wanted to see. Their religion wasn't enchantment, it was strength. All that he's ever been looking for.

 _It hurts like hell_ ; he said. They were hard words to forget. Pain wasn't so easily erased from memory - though life had been quiet for a few years now, as far as he thought possible, Chan had already experienced several pains of varying intensity. And as empathetic as he tried to be, he couldn't measure the size of the traumas Woojin carried that weren't under the possibility of his analysis fraught with uncomfortable sensitivity. What he saw wasn't even the tip of the iceberg. There was so much behind the layers that he was no longer able to undo, as if that was the limit to infiltrate everything the soldier had ever been to himself. It was barred even before it could be completely deciphered.

By comparison, he was so easy to read. There was nothing Chan didn't show in his transparency, nothing that he didn't live with intensity and under his skin. He was expressive as if he always sought to fill the void he represented in other ways. And he knew, Woojin had never let him forget how irrelevant was in the space he occupied. Whether or not being around was indifferent - maybe it still is, considering how it didn't even seem to have crossed Woojin's mind to say anything about his current condition rather than simply let Chan realize it. He tried to be understanding, to swallow the feeling that he might be adding the wrong measures and giving more than he received from the other. Getting angry wasn't common for his own behavior.

But it hurt. It hurt like hell, and Chan knew it was a different pain from the one Woojin had told him to feel two days ago, without the vampire having the courage to face aloud what Woojin knew he was aware of, but neither was willing to dispel the elephant in the room. It was suffocating. There was something inside Chan that diverged his concern from a sudden calmness, hoping that this experience would bring a selfish return of understanding. But he didn't want to have to put himself in a position where being called a monster was anything but positive - and he didn't want to add that adjective to everything that came to mind when he talked about Woojin.

He felt that he had pushed too much, that he should have gotten used to the idea by now. He didn't even know why it had never really crossed his mind or why, strangely, Woojin had always been so confident that it wouldn't happen to him. They weren't much better than fate, apparently. Chan gathered what he had in his hands again, tightening the chain against the bible so that his nails lightly scraped over the bare leather. Nameless and unread, just like his existence and all of his kind. They always had been and always would be there, not unlike what they should hate. Chan didn't want to consider Woojin his natural enemy, it was bullshit.

Werewolves have never been anything but a myth for those who never had to deal with them until then.

With a referent signal, the vampire bowed to Vlad's image, taking a few steps back through the empty chapel, his shoes not necessarily making sounds much louder than a human ear would hear. His footsteps left no mark, it was the shadow of many who had spent that day only to seek the same support in the hands of the first promised. He stopped in front of the doorway, tucking the chain into his shirt as he held the bible in one hand, the opposite collecting his sloppily abandoned belongings on the first seat of those lined up on the right side, horizontally.

As usual, Chan covered his eyes with his sunglasses and sought protection from the umbrella against the unusually strong sunshine for that time of the year. Being still under temporary false mourning, he was allowed to leave school early, not making much of a difference in practice since it was Thursday and everyone was much more looking forward to the weekend with their respective families than with the new tale he had to present to the five-year-olds who exchanged stickers of their parents' promises.

Strangely, that decision made Chan so much more comfortable than betrayed - he loved his profession, but he desperately needed a little more time. It wasn't the same as digesting the death of his parents, who he could no longer remember their faces, but the morbid feeling of a funeral was concentrated on the possibility of losing someone still so close. The only person truly inside of what he considered safe. Woojin could be anything, but he had never let go of his hand regardless of his hot-headed words and his inability to deal with his own feelings. It wasn't like he was so different about that.

It was hard to pinpoint how far his emotional intelligence was going, hard to tell where it hurt and where he might escape inside his head that seemed minimally comfortable when it was everything so chaotic. Chan knew himself well enough to name some of his nightmares and alphabetize his biggest monsters. At that moment, as he waited on the sidewalk to cross the street with boiling asphalt, all he could formulate coherently was that nothing was more intense than loving someone. A mother, a father, a brother, a friend, a lover. Such a strangely pleasant, killer and soothing feeling. Weapon and shield.

What exactly he was feeling?

 

"Hey!"

 

He raised his head, only then realizing that he was facing his own feet, which didn't move even as the car sound was reduced and the signal was closed - he imagined, after all, that it was near peak time and that such silence was unusual. He didn't know if that call was redirected to him, but he stepped aside when he felt something move so fast around, probably a medium-sized dog behind whatever had such a metallic sound that accompanied it. Or maybe he was just dragging his collar away from the owner, who kept repeating the same monosyllabic premise to get his attention. Chan wondered for a moment if he couldn't remember the name he had possibly given to the pet himself.

 

"Dammit"

 

Oh, he was close. Chan cocked his head to the side of what he heard, making his own judgment for what he had. It was a hot day, so it was inevitable that the person in question was sweating from the roots of his hair to the soles of his feet in his shoes. Padded sports shoes, for the sound they made. He also seemed agitated, whether from running or hyperactivity, Chan couldn't tell. He didn't seem very quiet either, having intruded himself into the space the vampire occupied.

 

"Didn't you see where he went?" The guy asked, his voice agitated and thus giving room for Chan to interpret the answer to his last question with more certainty. Besides, his words were huddled, flushed, almost as if he might lose them when he opened his mouth.

“Sorry, what?” Chan blinked slowly behind the spectacle lenses and, ignoring the initial shock for no apparent reason beyond dispersion, he gave a small smile. "To the right," He warned gently.

"Oh, sorry, I didn't realize you're ... well, a vampire."

 

If Chan could tell, he didn't really seem surprised by his finding, and Chan didn't know how to aggregate that information. It was something that used to be pretty obvious, from what he could judge from the reactions he received from strangers and people still very close. He was different, visibly different, wherever he was.

But he wouldn't be rude to something that didn't fit him a direct judgment. Chan was a politically active person in the city, even though he tried to stay within his circle, but he knew that it wasn't a broad situation and that many still preferred the freedom provided at dawn rather than risking themselves in the sun for mere convenience in accompanying humans in their routines.

 

"Yes, I am." Still with the smile on his face and trying to put on a less threatening stance than he thought he was being - and Chan would never again be able to use that tactic with anyone, he imagined - he turned his body toward his company. "It's a problem?"

"No, none." With a childish laugh, the guy went on. "By the way, my name is Jisung." He held out his hand, which took Chan a few seconds to return, trying not to make his cold touch uncomfortable.

"Chan." He answered briefly. "Shouldn't you go after your dog?"

"No need, he knows his way back."

"Right."

 

He had many doubts about this behavior, although he didn't think it was necessary to question it - and he hadn't the mind to prolong an unreasonable discussion about relatively innocent situations. Chan still had the same issues in his subconscious as the last minute, with a feeling of wear and tear that he was getting nowhere. It wasn't an impossible situation and he should have foreseen it. Woojin should have foreseen it, and now he no longer knew how to handle a situation whose possibility they had ignored almost stupidly.

He had to go, that was taking too much of his energy.

 

"Hm ..." Jisung moved again, his hand straight through his hair so that Chan could follow behind the lens of what he thought was a clumsy gesture. At least if he considered the disturbance so within his comfort zone. "I'm going to the right ..." He started, seeming not to know how to proceed. “You seemed to be heading in that direction. Can I walk you home? ”

 

Chan smiled, not exactly uncomfortable, but certainly not in the kindest way he could. Still, Jisung seemed to have understood the message very well.

 

"No, thank you."

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

“Aren't you supposed to have a photograph here?”

 

Woojin looked up from the paperwork, waggling his eyebrows under the brown bangs to indicate his questioning for the sudden intrusion. Although it wasn't all that unusual for a novice to be curious about certain details that he usually didn't even notice. He had that office for so many years, so many things in random places, it was hard to pinpoint exactly if something was missing.

 

“What are you talking about?” He questioned in an almost troubled, irritable yet veiled tone. He settled into the chair, crossing his legs and resting his bandaged hand on his lap.

 

Even after a few days, the discomfort hadn't passed and Woojin only considered this one of the problems of an unfinished action. The hours went on, the count went down and the feeling of anxiety was stuck in his throat ready to come out in a cry of anguish; that never really came, no matter how hard he tried.

He thought he was just channeling one thing over the other, as Seungmin had warned him to do eventually - or he was already doing before without realizing it. He had been trying not to extend discussions beyond what was professional and necessary, perhaps justifying why he didn't feel the fingers of his injured palm and why each time he remade his bandages they seemed to heal physically even though they left a feeling of sickness in the rest of his tired body.

Woojin felt that something was out of place, not to mention the portrait he didn't even remember putting where Jisung swore to have seen it. It might be naive of him when he got that space to think that he really wanted to keep the image of anyone who had passed in his life at some point.

 

"Never mind." Jisung gestured vaguely, bringing some grey folders with small nominal tags in the upper corner from the file cabinet.

 

He sat opposite on the long table, scattering a few more papers against the pile on which Woojin was in charge of whatever his most administrative function was. Jisung didn't quite understand how things still worked, he didn't have that much time inside the quarters, so it was confusing to know why Woojin was in charge of tasks that his record didn't describe. Maybe it was because injured soldiers weren't really effective in wars, although they were no longer fighting so much against temporary threats, but that was only a guess. Jisung had the impression that Woojin wouldn't refuse a fight if it was necessary, regardless of his physical condition.

He spent a few more moments looking at his company before turning to the folders, sorting them out in a sloppy way, not caring about it as long as he had room to be more precise in his tasks. But he couldn't concentrate. Occasionally Jisung would look up at Woojin once more, with a thousand questions that the least of his common sense wouldn't allow him to ask. It didn't seem like something he wanted or should get into.

He cleared his throat uncomfortably.

 

"How did you get that bandage again?" He asked, trying to sound less suspicious than he looked. He wasn't, not about that. Woojin knew better.

“Cooking.” Woojin shortened an already repeated answer a few times. "Speak up, what do you want?"

"Me?"

"Yes, you." Woojin set down his pen, resting his forearms on the table and closing his hands without necessarily pressing his palms; he didn't want to make things worse. "You're restless and seem to be looking for something." Jisung wasn't hard to read or maybe Woojin was just getting more used to the frequency of the other around him. This could be relatively dangerous, but he still doubted that the suspicion he showed would go so far. "Does it have to do with the photo?"

"Aha!" Jisung stood up, pointing straight at the older who rolled his eyes, already waiting for what would follow. "So you know which photo it is."

"No, I don't know, but you know or you wouldn't be waiting to hear about it."

 

Woojin had just fishing, a somewhat misleading act in Jisung's vision when he was struggling to understand some behaviors. Since, unlike Woojin, he was all week on account of those files, it was obvious that at some point he would come across his 'friend' data, which was shallow and didn't explain much, but it also turned out to be more than enough. Each needed to prove himself to be part of that team and he could tell that what had written on Woojin's record was an attitude he expected from someone of such merit within the quarters. He just didn't understand why whenever they seemed to bring the subject to the table, which initially carried on Woojin's back the efficiency of ruining a coven, he acted as if nothing had happened.

Not that Jisung was an example of discretion, but he would love that his acceptance process was a little more complex than the basic lie he had told when he found a dead wolf in his backyard and took it with the excuse that was his ruse. The opportunity was there for anyone who wanted to catch it, and he wouldn't lie if he said he was also a little desperate for instability until the previous year.

 

"Your file says your parents are unknown and your only family member passed away before you came in." Woojin raised his eyebrows at Jisung, hoping and knowing he would continue. He didn't seem very willing to hold the information to himself, which would eventually be a failure as a soldier, with varying degrees of aggravation.

"You've been spying me?"

"N-No, no, that's not it." Jisung cleared his throat, gesturing like a puppet doll in all directions. "The old men told me to change things while you were gone, it's not my fault."

"But you shouldn't open a folder if it's not yours, Jisung."

 

Woojin stood up, looking slightly higher than Jisung remembered when they sat down, even though he showed no threat to his posture. In fact, he looked exhausted - as if all those days off from strange health problems weren't enough to make him look less downcast. If Jisung looked closer, he looked pale. His skin had subnormal gray tones, and as much as he could feel the intensity of his temper hadn't changed, it was as if he could no longer act on it.

 

“Dude, are you sure this was just an accident?” They both turned their attention to Woojin's hand, hanging motionless next to his hip. "You look like trash."

"First, this is no way to talk to a superior." Woojin corrected bitterly. "Second, go to the point or beyond not getting your hands on those files anymore, I'll make your disappearance accidental."

"Take it easy, okay?"

 

Jisung came around the table, though strangely terrified yet confident; but either of them would eventually win this silent battle so that it was evident that he wasn't as sure of himself as he would have liked. Woojin, on the other hand...

He rummaged through the various folders on the table, trying not to drop any stacks or disrupt what had already been done for obvious reasons; He didn't want to bear the consequences of his shaking hands and nerves being tested. Jisung found his inability to deal with someone incredible when he had just killed a wolf alone a few weeks ago.

 

"Here." Jisung pointed to the sticker at the top of the file, whose name of Woojin seemed slightly erased by time. He opened it, needing to draw air again as he felt his gaze burning over his shoulders toward the too yellowed papers for just under a decade. “Hm.” His mouth was dry and his eyes blurred, but he handled the document closer to his face, as if it were going to solve something more foolishly. "Initiation."

“Never said so much and at the same time so little…”

"It says you burned a coven, but all the register numbers are missing one." Jisung pointed to the file and lifted his face, his lips twitching as he realized that Woojin was already studying him closely, his eyes fixed on him, looking for something that he couldn't identify but felt he couldn't deliver it that easily. "I-I mean, it's an impressive feat yet, don't get me wrong, just ...."

"You're wondering if this witch is still alive, aren't you?" Woojin smiled, a gesture far from comforting or friendly to Jisung. For some reason it sounded like wax, melting with every word. "Witches are extinct," he said slowly. “They don't exist anymore. End of talk. ”

"It doesn't seem that simple to me."

"Believe me, it is."

 

They stared at each other for a while, Jisung still maintaining his belief that it was far greater than they could possibly prevent, even though everything was apparently under control in their fields. There might be no more reports there, but nothing could be summed up in as little as Woojin had done. It seemed utopian, even to those who lived with their heads in the moon.

 

"So who is Seungmin?"

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll come back to correct, I promise, I just wanted to finish this chapter soon because it was making me anguished ksks
> 
> Corrections, constructive comments and theories are always welcome. <3


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How can you be so selfish?” The vampire thought about moving away the hands that touched Woojin, but kept himself in position, only tightening his skin unconsciously.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> T.W.: mention of abortion
> 
> You can skip the half of the first part if you get uncomfortable
> 
> Forgive me Bang Chan, but the chapter took this long because I procrastinated in college, accumulated activities, and didn't have time to write. But now that I'm here, let's go to the fact that by Christmas I intend to release another fanfiction and that maybe this is the last chapter of this year. Or maybe not, it depends. 
> 
> Enjoy the chapter <3

 

 

 

 

  " **W** hat?"

 

Woojin retreated a few steps, resting his bandaged hand directly on the table, ignoring the shock of pain that went up to his wrist toward his elbow and shoulder. He took a deep breath. This was definitely a curve out of his plans, a situation he was absolutely sure he wouldn't have to face anytime soon. You see, he wasn't stupid, since he always knew what he was getting into and where he should or shouldn't step when the path was made of eggs. Though he had acted in despair when entering the quarters sounded a viable option, he never really wanted to risk Seungmin's life, whom he had always been close to - though now thinking about any closeness to the warlock made his stomach heavy. Hurting him was never an option, and the consequences he still faced reflected nothing more than his inability to keep even the smallest detail in place. He had clearly lost control and was still making the same amateur mistakes as before.

Still, that didn't explain exactly how Jisung had managed to get to Seungmin's name. His first attitude when he assumed his present position — which was fixed on his record, however much he remained in the most variable lines of inner need — had been to vanish with the one person who came alive from that insane witch hunt. Woojin erased every trace of Seungmin's identity, although he couldn't deny the absence of one of the bodies from all those recorded. He never knew how to forge physical deaths, but this situation was serious. For him and eventually for Seungmin.

 

"Who is Seungmin?" Jisung repeated, more slowly as if he was trying to explain a basic theory to a five-year-old. "It says here that he was part of the coven." He turned the page, pointing to the slightly blurred name on the list of witches in the file. "But I found nothing about him and the body count was six, not seven."

"Let me see."

 

Ignoring the trembling sensation, Woojin quickly brought the file to his chest, analyzing the name printed with the tip of his index finger as if he could finish erasing it with sufficient pressure. The record dated long before Woojin recognized the coven as a way to entering in the quarters by initiation, years earlier than the fire that killed each of the names transcribed there. Seungmin wasn't supposed to be part of that file, he was just a child at the time.

 

"It's wrong." He cleared his throat, trying to keep the intrusive growl in his throat. "There was no one with that name there." Woojin lied without thinking twice, trying to think of a solution fast enough to correct a mistake that should be his - but he was unaware of the nature of that document and now wondered how many others had passed when he tried erasing his past to protect his future.

"Hm," Jisung replied, seeming to have swallowed well whatever Woojin was trying to sell him. Not even he was sure what it was about. "Was he killed by the witches?"

 

From their conception, Woojin would rather bet on that idea than admit to himself a mistake that could have cost him a great deal by then; but that name couldn't continue there, Seungmin's existence should be forgotten and action taken at the earliest opportunity. He closed the file, taking a few steps back to put it in the nearest drawer and where he knew he would have easier access eventually.

 

"Maybe." This time Woojin forced his voice to sound more confident, yet nonchalant. “I'll file the case and try to fix it later.” He assured, crediting himself with the responsibility of “finding out” what he was trying to cover up.

 

Honestly, he hoped that Jisung wasn't considering stepping up in his job and displaying a mistake no one seemed to give a damn about after years, thus gaining some prestige for his careful handling of a simple task – which began being the responsibility of Woojin, where he was currently only involved in those roles if it was really necessary to swallow shameful attitudes and boast of inhuman behavior. He recognized that, at least now. He was as ambitious and narcissistic as anyone who had to walk the same path to get where they had come. Professional ethics were too malleable in that kind of homicidal-suicidal environment.

While the silence, not as rare as it seemed, again filled the atmosphere suffocated by questions and anguish that Woojin thought he had already buried, so many strands of thought led to the fact that Jisung wasn't that different from the team; which he had chosen to be part of at such a young age. Like him or Soyeon, Jisung had a record of feats seen as "heroic" and had the coolness of a hunter; in theory. Except for the first day that had forced Woojin to keep his eyes on the other as having a secret of his own – as much as he knew he would receive more glory than martyr for the death of the beta that attacked him – he had never actually seen Jisung in the field.

The conclusion that he was less foreign to Jisung than the opposite obviously made Woojin uncomfortable. It didn't exist in the short or long term something that would not be harmful to him, it seemed.

 

"Jisung" Woojin caught the attention of the concentrated boy, rearranging the files by name before he seemed to restart the check again. “How did you get into the quarters?” He asked with genuine curiosity, returning to the chair as his knees buckled more than enough. The stress of the whole current situation was beginning to affect his physique beyond what he had expected from an inevitable transition.

"I killed a wolf in the backyard of my house."

 

It wasn't an unusual situation, they were called for the same reasons constantly when inconsequent humans decided to build their homes near forested areas considered by the authorities to be at risk, but that was far from being a recent problem - and with "recent" they talk specifically of recent decades when _supernatural_ creatures came to be known as more than urban legends. However, Jisung's conclusive way of explaining something that would take hours, and he had already realized that he might be thrilled even on the simplest of subjects, made Woojin frown and lean his back more firmly on the seat. Jisung's excitement about his own deeds didn't correspond to what he knew he felt about the coven and the whole story that Woojin preferred to have died with the witches.

 

"Just that?"

"Well, it was enough to get in." Innocently Jisung looked up from his papers, his shoulders tenser than before. Woojin could hear, clearly as if he had his ear to Jisung's chest, his heart beating anxiously. “It isn't a big deal ...”

"For a person with no experience, killing a werewolf alone is impressive," He went on, deciding to continue the conversation even though he felt briefly guilty about treating Jisung as if he were suspected of a crime. In his place, Woojin might consider himself as intrigued as he was, even though still in his present position, he recognized that his superiors had as many secrets to themselves as they have with each other. He was less high in his place than the one Jisung occupied, as he seemed to be giving Woojin too much credit for. "I wouldn't be brave enough." He resumed the conversation, falsely concentrating on returning to his activities, part of his mind focused on the document in the drawer while the other kept alert to Jisung's every little move at the discussion.

 

Woojin didn't expect much but he had relatively high expectations for what he could draw from that talk. Jisung looked uncomfortable, and Woojin knew he was lying - perhaps because in years of observing his coworkers he was able to identify certain patterns when they were under pressure to tell a truth they had promised not to let slip. This wasn't just from ordinary humans, it was something about that side of any creature that easily protruded from.

 

"You know, Jisung ..." He started again, dragging some of the papers aside, where he could rest his forearms more easily on the table. His hands clasped, even though he avoided teasing the palm of one of them too much, irritated by an 'accidental' injury. “There is a Buddhist proverb that says there are three things that can't be hidden for long –“

"The sun, the moon and the truth."

"So you know where I want to go."

 

To be honest, Woojin expected fire to fire. Perhaps it was that eagerness to start a discussion, to feed the savagery he had been cultivating, even if it didn't allow him to break into physical aggression and lose control at once. It was a risk he had to learn to live with, but at the same time, he found himself without as much command as he seemed to possess over the wolf that altered his body, his head, and left him on the brink of crossing boundaries that had been set both by himself and by major forces. But Jisung seemed to excel or, at least, to expand his ideas of taking him to the same extreme that his own reflection constantly proposed.

 

"I needed money," Jisung explained, not meeting his eyes, twitching his fingers convulsively over the documentation. He seemed self-conscious enough to stop seconds later.

"For what?"

"An abortion."

 

Woojin definitely didn't expect that. He remained silent for a few seconds, staring at his co-worker with an expression that might have been considered indifferent if it weren't for the slightly slanted eyebrows beneath his bangs and his frown at the new information received with less effort than he was willing to do. People were unpredictable, his view about each one always in need of revision when something like that happened or seemed about to happen; and yet, Woojin didn't know what to expect from someone who seemed to have much more compassion than himself when he gave a friend to the fire. His opinions on certain subjects were never relevant until he was confronted with reality in that way.

 

“I didn't think it would work at first” In the silence of the other, Jisung took the initiative to continue, after all he no longer wanted to feel as guilty as he felt for what still sounded like the best option. Even if he got a job with fixed income and care that his lack of education would not allow him to have if he carried his girlfriend's pregnancy forward. "It wasn't dead when it arrived in my garden, but it would die sooner or later." He pursed his lips as if he didn't recognize the very coldness of his words. Woojin remembered well when ethics and morals were still a recurring problem and invalidated many of his nights of sleep. “I needed money because I had just graduated and couldn't possibly be a father and… I don't think that even she seemed very happy with the idea of having a child. I was only eighteen, I didn't even know what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.” Jisung shuffled across the chair, shrugging and again wringing his hands completely randomly, clearly distressed as if it were recent. “I think just - I mean, I'm sure now, that was an opportunity. And even if she hadn't aborted, I still don't think there would be any chance of it working. ”

"So, you lied to get in here," Woojin concluded; not that he was disinterested in every detail of his story, he just felt that he had nothing to say about a decision that affected little or nothing in his own life.

"Is that all you heard?"

"No, but you have your reasons and I am the least able to judge you for that." He softened his expression, watching as the tension in Jisung's shoulders seemed to have eased as well. There were no complete virtues after all. “However, as your supervisor, I can point out that we have a problem with your initiation.”

"You won't –"

“No, I won't tell anyone.” It's not as if his own file hasn't been altered, as if he hadn't lied to the way where he had arrived. Woojin was climbing step after step hiding facts, burning documents, pretending that nothing had happened. The fall was imminent but he wanted to go for it alone. “Just be careful with that. Who you killed or prevented from born only matters to them if it's a public enemy. ”

 

Too bad Jisung didn't quite know to distinct them well enough yet.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Chan wanted the temperature in those corners of the city not to be so controversial, that at one point it wasn't as cold as it was hot a few hours earlier. Or maybe the sweat that ran down the side of his temple was no longer caused by the rise in thermometers, but because he was walking too fast, his shoulders tense and his hand always around the symbol attached to the silver chain around his neck. His steps were automatic, but they were down the street ready to start a run - a bad idea to let one sense command, since he was already at a disadvantage by having them at different intensities compared to the vast majority of the population.

He kept repeating to himself that it was no big deal. It wasn't the first time either, and he always knew that they ended well, regardless of the over-concern about situations that he should have learned to deal with — but no, that was definitely not a false alarm or even something he might consider ordinary, routine. It would be nothing the same from now on, and Chan feared that things would repeat themselves with the same intensity as before. That the feeling of the world crumbling and hopes to begin to fade had been something he would experience only once in all his years of life.

 

“Mr. Bang! Mr. Bang! ”

 

He couldn't point out what time it was, whether it was early or late, his conception of time seemed lost when it was the first and simultaneously the last of his priorities. Of course, it was relevant to the minutes that would take him to his destination, but not exactly how long it had been within twenty-four hours of waking up until that second. And as much as he wasn't quite aware of whether the sun had set or not, he could tell that it wasn't the best time for a child to be out on the street - when cars were barely passing or were running fast enough for raising dusting off the ground and moving the vampire's wavy hair away from his face.

 

"Not now, Jeongin," He replied, not quite realizing whether or not his words would reach the boy across the street.

 

He run for the parched garden, the first concrete steps, and slammed his shoulder over the door, the knob fortunately easy to move to unlock the entrance. Perhaps because it wasn't his home, Chan felt like he was invading a space that didn't belong to him no matter how many times Woojin had told him that it didn't really matter. He tried not to think about it, at least in this particular case, being up by the idea that he had been called for a reason that went beyond self-interest - and the list of reasons about why he just wanted to confirm that Woojin had been well had tripled in the recent days, increasing each time he turned the subject even further.

 

“Woojin” Chan called in a medium tone, without the need to make his nervousness evident. All around him was silence, even with every step he took into the living room; and he could hear in his own ears the heart that, contrary to the basics, was still there, agitated, making him dizzy even if he allowed himself to take a deep breath with every inch of walking. "Woojin?"

“ _In the bathroom”_

 

Woojin's voice was hoarse, blowing in his ear no matter how far away he was. It was hard to ignore even the sound of the wind when nothing else made a noise. Confused in many ways and clearly with his most basic notions affected by nervousness, Chan took a deep breath again, moving his head around as he quietly led his steps down the corridor toward the last door. He grabbed the doorframe, finding the unlocked doorknob and hearing more clearly the gasp from inside the small room.

 

“Open the cabinet over the sink, one bottle has amiodarone, it's small and flat”

 

Woojin now spoke in a slurred voice, the sound of his words wet and his breathing hard. Chan could tell he was in the space between the shower stall and the toilet, huddled in a specific corner with a strong smell of anything that naturally went against what he knew was characteristic of the other. His mind couldn't associate the situation with anything familiar at the moment, and if Woojin could handle whatever happened, even if not alone, he would consider no choice but to be led by what was asked.

He concentrated first on groping the sink cabinet, opening it with tension in his fingers as he searched for the bottle in question without causing any unnecessary damage. Then, still under Woojin's lower and lower instructions, he turned the drawer behind a packed syringe, unconcerned that he had things in hand that no sane person would keep at home - but there were things that went beyond understanding of who wasn't constantly involved in dangers that no one else would be willing to take voluntarily.

Chan would lie if he said he wasn't irritated by his subconscious's reaction in times of tension - even if Woojin acted with a calmness that had belonged to him many years ago. Things shouldn't happen that way, he shouldn't feel his hands shaking as he knelt beside the soldier's body and immediately brought one of his palms to his face, balancing everything he had achieved only on the left-hander. He could feel him cold, extremely cold, for a normal person or for someone who was far from weak to anything.

 

"You know, you need to calm down," Woojin muttered, releasing the pressure on his words as soon as he validated Chan's presence. Lowering his fingertips down the other's face, the vampire can feel the closed eyelids and jaw tension from the pain he didn't need to see to feel.

"I know, I'm sorry." Chan took a deep breath, gathering his wrist and swallowing under his tongue with tremendous effort. There was a strange taste in his mouth, a discomfort in his chest that he didn't know how to name.

"I'll tell you just once what you need to do, okay?" Woojin struggled, seeming to adjust himself to turn his body toward him. Without trusting his own voice, Chan just nodded, waiting. "You're going to take the syringe and fill it up until I tell you to stop, all right?"

 

It was a ridiculous situation, if he could have more clarity of thought. It wasn't he who was in whatever state of frailty, it wasn't he who had to be so bewildered; and yet, Woojin remained falsely impassive, though occasionally he muted a grunted in his throat with pain. Forcing his body to take control of himself, Chan took his time — though he forced himself to be more agile — filling the inside of the syringe as he listened to the other's request to stop. Occasionally he felt Woojin's fingers lightly brush against his without sudden movements, only preventing him from causing any disaster when clearly the effort to hold his head in place was greater than holding the objects in the same position with both hands.

 

“Do you think you can do it?” The question led to the other implied question and Chan bit his lip uncertainly. Woojin wasn't innocent, but the context itself meant a lot if analyzed without so much panic involved on one side. "If you make a mistake, you can kill me."

"You aren't helping."

"I don't want to die, just as I know you won't want to kill me," Woojin repeated more completely, with longer pauses as it was too difficult for him to complete the reasoning. "You know exactly where my vein is, Chan."

 

It took Chan a few seconds to take action, an uncomfortable shiver down his spine as he grasped Woojin's forearm, guided by himself toward his palm. He tightened his cold, sweat-soaked skin so that he could more accurately feel the veins beneath his touch rather than just knowing where exactly the blood flowed. He pressed only one with his thumb, fangs already tearing at the edges of his mouth as he sank the needle as far as he knew it was safe to go. Woojin's muscles were unconsciously tense and it made Chan even more uncomfortable to realize that he still had no idea about what he was doing.

He cut his breath as he retracted his wrist with the syringe, using his thumb to stifle the small opening that led straight into the vein used for the injection. Chan could smell the blood, feel the texture beneath his fingerprint, but did or would do nothing about it.

 

"Thanks," Woojin said, placing one hand over Chan's still at the crook of his elbow.

"You can't do it with me"

 

The vampire let out a breath, still not moving the position of his arms and hands when he only leaned his torso forward and rested his forehead on the Woojin's shoulder, letting an extra weight come off his back. It wasn't all right, after all, nothing was immediately regressed and Chan knew the situation was serious. He knew this was only part of what was likely to last a few more hours, and there would be no point in lowering his guard for a second. And yet, just the thought of doing something was better than being in the shade, as he had been for almost a month about what he should have at least suspected from the beginning. He couldn't pretend nothing happened.

 

“You have a lot to explain to me,” He continued, wishing for the first time in years to be able to see more than just feel how Woojin reacted to what he meant. He didn't have to be so clear to be understood.

"I have" Chan felt the soldier nod tiredly as he rested his cheek against the strands of his parched hair. "But maybe not now."

"Just tell me what happene–"

“I was poisoned”

 

Unlike the other, Woojin didn't wish he could actually see all that he, with the gift of such a clear vision, could. How the cut in his palm had eroded all his fingers, how his prominent veins were dark under the already tanned skin. How the poison dripped from the corner of his mouth and how beneath his soaked body was the dark content of the wolfsbane that clogged his system for a while. Perhaps now it would lessen the pain that had come tearing without warning from the inside out, paralyzing his body and taking all his energies at once. The phone, thrown across the box against the sole of his bare feet, had no salvation. Woojin knew exactly what had happened, it was only hard to believe that finally his actions had devastating consequences.

 

"By who? With what?"

"It doesn't matter now." Chan raised his head again, followed by his shoulders and back movement, seeming to really want to _see_ what Woojin's words didn't show. Maybe it was too much for him to understand, maybe it had so much more than he wasn't worth carrying.

"What the hell do you think that isn't so important when it almost took you from me?"

“If it's already gone, there's no reason to –“

“How can you be so selfish?” The vampire thought about moving away the hands that touched Woojin, but kept himself in position, only tightening his skin unconsciously. “Why is asking for help so hard for you? You could have told me from the start, we could have found a much faster solution –“

"Chan, this has no cure, what do you think you could do?"

 

Woojin, at least this time, had no problem looking at the other in the eye as he always felt uncomfortable to do, being hard for him to identify anything through them alone - but Chan was expressive enough that the rest of his face admitted what his voice wouldn't speak. And part of him envied the vampire for having some way of communicating other than words, after all, Chan could do nothing but deduce if Woojin didn't confirm every reaction he had consciously or not.

 

“There is no way to change now.” Woojin propped one hand on the floor, dragging his hip back and straightening his posture as if he wanted to rise to his feelings. "Just look ahead." He sighed, dropping his head against the wall and relaxing his shoulders. "You can stay. If you want to."

"I never went anywhere."

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The usual: comments, theories and constructive criticism are always welcome
> 
> But before I go, this time I wanted to ask y'all a question: Do you think Woojin is a villain or a hero?


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I had no idea you guys knew each other too,” Jisung gestured, moving from one to the other, which looked great in their own companies before he arrived. “Woojin never looked very, well, vampire friendly”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Looks like I was wrong ~

 

 

 

 **H** e kept facing the ground, even though there was really nothing below his knees that caught his attention. He felt no cold in his legs or any warmth in his hands - although the wind coming through the window still struck his bare heels and the heat couldn't reach his fingers hidden by his sweatshirt. That Chan couldn't sleep was far from new, it was natural that vampires were always on the alert and old habits were hard to kill by the roots. Besides, the situation didn't allow him to close his eyes for so long, only surrendering to his body fatigue enough to lie down, feeling thick enough to sink into the mattress and sheets that were not his own. Nothing there had any characteristic features of his persona, not even of the one to whom the clothes he wore, the towels on which he had dried, the limbs that filled the other side of the bed.

He turned, as usual with little movement, placing his hands below his face. Woojin's heart was still beating too fast for a human and he believed it was slow for a werewolf - and of course, he was drawing that from conclusions completely based on ridiculous comparisons, such as he could hear from the heartbeat of medium or large dogs. They hadn't really discussed anything about it, and Chan felt like he was missing something in the midst of change. Not that the pre-teen Woojin that he remembered still existed inside the shell of a soldier trained to kill and die. Or his own child version that was afraid of being forgotten for the thousandth time. By then, he knew how to live alone, to feel alone.

 

“The much you think is starting to bother me”

 

Even with no effect, Chan blinked a few times, as if he didn't expect Woojin to be awake - because all seemed to indicate that the exhaustion of events from hours before had taken away any desire the other had to remain healthily conscious; even affecting his own desire to keep his eyes open, he just couldn't do anything about it for a while. Chan shrank a little deeper into his space, trying to occupy as little as possible for reasons beyond his comprehension. It seemed automatic, to be so small to anyone who sounded too big.

 

"I didn't mean to disturb you," he sighed, dragging one hand toward the space between the pillow and his neck. "I'm as tired as you"

"I see."

 

Woojin could feel it too, though the vibration that came from Chan's whole body was minimal, close to zero. Maybe it was still an effect that reverberated from all the stress that he had caused on him, or maybe it all boiled down to the fact that he felt strangely more accommodating to the vampire's presence while he could feel it. Not just by touch. He could hear his muffled heart beating, could feel the warmth coming from his palms even if he didn't realize it himself. He could smell his own perfume impregnated with every inch of his company. Chan was there as a sensory presence and that, for some reason, didn't make Woojin uncomfortable for breaking his paradigm of isolation.

 

“If it makes you sleep, you can ask whatever you want”

"I still don't know if I really want to know."

 

Woojin frowned, unlike Chan's carefulness to settle over the comforters causing enough disturbance in all peace as he simply flung himself aside, one arm taking up the space between both bodies. easily approaching the vampire's elbow. He moved his fingers just a little farther, pulling what he could from the other by his sweatshirt until he surrendered and eventually touched his hands. Slightly, with Chan sliding his thumb very close to the cut in the soldier's palm.

 

“Want to start here?” Although Woojin felt that he should be asking the question rather than answering, it seemed irrelevant at first. It was a question that he still didn't consider the right time to address and not even where to start if the intention was to explain what was happening to Chan.

"No, definitely not." He shook his head, less brutally this time. "How about the beginning?"

 

It wasn't a completely stupid question if you stopped to think. Some things were already obvious and could very well be stifled by the many other consequences that led to that chaotic present. But with all the persistence of knowing the truth, it was clear that Chan wanted so much more. Perhaps a confirmation aloud for what neither of them had yet managed to put on the table, unwilling to argue for fear of the consequences. Woojin hated that term, but nothing seemed to fit the context anymore, even with the soft touches and silences broken by the natural sound of the night.

 

"How did it happen?"

“A wolf attacked me during the end of one of the patrols.” Woojin averted his eyes to the pale, cold hand against his own, the edge of Chan's nails nervously scraping the space between his fingers. "He bit my waist and I couldn't go after him."

"How much time this have?"

"One month, I think."

 

But it seemed a lot longer, each day dragged on as if it lasted for years. Woojin didn't know exactly how he could still find himself in such a short space of time, wondering why he couldn't start over - but it never meant that the next first day everything would go back to normal. It was nothing close to how things happened and would continue to happen. That was his reality, and if before he didn't know how or when he was going to die, this time it didn't comfort him to have completely lost the thread where life ended. It all seemed a single way, leading to a single moment. Woojin knew it wouldn't be of natural causes.

 

"Why you didn't tell me?"

“And what would you do if you knew before?” Woojin had relived the question of hours ago, but in an exhausted, clearly hopeless tone. “I didn't plan to say anything to anyone”

"So you would just leave?"

 

Woojin had been avoiding thinking about that part of his non-plan. Although he knew that he would have to abandon everything, even Chan was aware that staying as he was wasn't an option, but talking was much simpler than doing. He insisted that there was nothing else to hold him in a dusty house, whose floor-to-ceiling furnishings had nothing like his personality - a person who lived in that century, by the way. His house hadn't been a home for many years. He didn't know his parents' whereabouts and his only familiar figure he didn't even remember the face anymore. Still, there was a single detail that made him want to be there. Exactly where he was, though not under the circumstances he was in.

 

"No, probably not," he admitted. "I didn't even think about that."

"What-" Chan broke off, his body moving slightly uncomfortably and unconsciously closer to Woojin. The soldier knew that the other was aware enough about the space between them to know exactly where he was on the mattress. "I don't know how to ask." He moistened his lips, making Woojin catch a glimpse of his fangs for a moment. Chan hadn't yet untied his hands, but positioned them closer to his face, ending any movement. "How it feels?"

“At that moment?” Horrible, if he had to be honest. But there was no contract that required him to say aloud what could be a question interpreted in multiple ways. "I'll survive"

“I know how you are now, physically. I want to know how you are handling it. ”

"Could be worse."

"Stop being so vague." Chan snorted, unfortunately unable to see the small smile on Woojin's face at his visible impatience. "I just want to know how you are."

“I don't know.” Woojin took a while to answer, trying to put all thoughts on a one-way side. Good or bad was too vague. He just didn't own his body, his own mind. Whatever his wishes, they were no longer his own. The idea of controlling a runaway car didn't make anyone very confident about the future, not even the most experienced driver. "I'm something now, but it's not me."

"Don't say that..."

"You can't see it, but you can feel it too." He went on, defending his point in a low tone as a secret. “You said so many times about not being able to identify my smell or think my temperature was too high. I know you realize that my touch is not the same or that it has much more than you can notice that way. ”

“People change, Woojin”

"You're in denial, believe me, me too."

 

Chan moved his hand as the other shift away, immediately missing the heat he was unable to hold alone. Restlessly, Woojin moved again, taking up more space as he rested his back on the mattress, his right shoulder close to Chan's chest given the limited diameter. Maybe it was just a miscalculation, but it didn't bother him that they were so close. Chan never really had a chance to enjoy any second without being pushed, without any reason driving them away. His whole body tingled and felt relatively strange, as if he was in the catbird seat, but can't do anything with it.

 

"I know you're still the same." Chan traced his fangs lightly on his lower lip, curling his arms against his own body, creating a barrier between himself and Woojin. "Or we wouldn't be having this conversation."

“How optimistic are you -“

"I'm not a good loser, that's all." He sighed, with a slight whistle, too close to one of Woojin's ears, who recoiled into what was possible. "You haven't shifted yet, have you?"

"What is the reason for the guess?"

"That's a no." He concluded without difficulty, with the help of his feet sunk in the comforter pulling the rest of his body down a few inches, touching Woojin minimally as he rested his forehead on his shoulder and took a deep breath. All because the situation made him overwhelmed by the presence of the soldier, feeling so small when everywhere in the room shouted Woojin's name blatantly. "Is that why you wanted to see Seungmin?"

“I thought he could solve it.” Woojin averted his eyes, his attention now turned to the ceiling covered with cracks and cobwebs around the lamps hardly changed over the last two years, at least.

 

He had so much to say about that, though his actions explained on their own. Woojin would never have turned to Seungmin if he hadn't been desperate, would never seek protection from who could - and tried - hurt him if it hadn't been his last resort. Or who could give him more answers and talk efficiently. Woojin felt as if it were all that was left as if his true self on one day had just stand up and left without leaving a note, but with an obvious message that he would never return. He was now nothing more than a jumble of confused feelings, broken hearts, swallowed words, and oppressed behaviors.

 

“You smelled like blood that day”

“Glad one of us has a good memory.” Woojin knew where Chan wanted to go, but he also knew how directly or indirectly knowing the answer to his questions first went through denial. He couldn't see his face from their position, but he could hear, clear in the silence of a few seconds, the sound of his heartbeat. Out of rhythm, finding a crack that shouldn't be there. It wouldn't be him to break what always took a long time to piece together. “If it's any consolation, I'm bleeding a lot lately”

"That shouldn't be seen as positive." Woojin felt him frown against the fabric of his too-thin shirt. "When is the next full moon?"

"At any moment"

 

Woojin knew that giving vague answers made Chan angry and didn't give away his reasons for being. It still kept him out of a situation where clearly none had even the slightest control over it. Although the closest to the "supernatural" was still the vampire and his quirks, Woojin was still very different from what Chan was. Werewolves and vampires have always been represented oppositely for plausible reasons. Perhaps the only shared experience of all this was the isolation that Woojin quite consciously put himself in as Chan had always done on his own until only each other remained. Chan was his hardest habit to give up, and apparently it was sadly mutual.

 

“You know, it still hurts” Woojin was clearly referring to various topics, there was no real need to make things as explicit as the other. He moved, forcing Chan to return his head to the pillow on the automatic and allow Woojin to turn his whole body toward him. "Better stop here”

"Sure"

 

This time it was the vampire who demanded the most space between them, dragging his hip to the opposite side of the bed, turning his back on Woojin, and extending his arm to turn off the lamp even though it made no real difference in the room naturally dimly lit by the streetlights. Moreover, closing the eyes or turning off all the lamps didn't necessarily mean that they couldn't _see_ each other - more figuratively from Chan, who nevertheless missed every curve of space occupied by Woojin. The soldier, in turn, saw him all over, huddled against his own arms, tempted to disappear.

Woojin put his hand under the blankets and dragged them upward in a gentle movement, swallowing every inch of Chan's body as well - hoping that his heat would eradicate without hindrance, that he would no longer feel as helpless as Woojin was following him in such miserable way. Unfortunately, that was all he would do. Everything that could be done.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Woojin closed his fingers, pressing them against his palm, feeling the veins bounce at his wrist, but nothing reaching his forearm. It didn't feel as if at any time there had been any trace of the cut closed at night - without his assistance, no matter how much Chan had collaborated in redoing the bandage after an uncomfortable silence through conversations he wished he hadn't had, but they were less terrifying then face each other. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary and about that there was a wide range of factors.

Of course, Woojin could still feel the itch beneath his nails or the discomfort of having to shave twice every day and feed himself like a sumo wrestler would feed. His body used calories to maintain his strength and temperature, no matter how many degrees it was inside or outside of the house. His hair was also messy when it fell over his eyes, curling into his lashes at every opportunity. But in short, his dark circles didn't exist, the exhaustion didn't erode his bones, and the color of his skin seemed to have gone back to something less dead - or maybe it was just a visual comparison with the time when he had seen the difference in intensity between him and Chan in every aspect.

He shifted his face to the side, his hip resting on the counter as he sought to find the image of the vampire sitting on the chair, his blank expression turned to the mug covered with half the synthetic blood that Woojin had made a habit of storing in his fridge. The smell seemed as strong as ever, soaking in every direction, leaving the soldier's throat dry and bothering his stomach - strangely not the way he would expect it to be. He wasn't disgusted by what he had been seeing for a few years, but now there was a certain longing and fascination with what blood and flesh represented, how it filled Chan's normally pale lips with each lingering sip.

Woojin stared at the empty bottle nearby, then the refrigerator, but discarded it in the trash before leaving the place he was for a long time, looking more clearly at the cloak that seemed to have fallen over his head. As if certain things had finally found space and no longer disturbed him - the phase of denial was over, but there were still many stages in which he would have to turn his eyes to his own and not let himself drift on to find out anything about it in the worst possible way. He reflexively opened the fridge, staring at the pieces of meat that had been there for some time now, remembering the last time he had gone to the market was to be about two weeks ago and he didn't want to have to waste it. And cooking wasn't in his plans indefinitely either.

Maybe if …

 

"There's someone at the door." Chan muttered without moving - in fact, he'd stopped to try to focus on his own words. "And looks nervous"

 

Woojin leaned against the door, letting the magnetization of the fridge finish its work before heading out of the kitchen. He knew exactly who was standing in front of the steps at the entrance, shifting his weight from foot to foot as if he was in doubt about ringing the bell or not. Honestly, as suspicious as it might sound to answer even before any signal from the other, he just wanted to keep his ears from being disturbed by what he should have gotten rid of if he didn't want that kind of problem. Just saying it wasn't working didn't always help.

He released the locks and opened the door just wide enough to catch Jisung's immediate surprise reaction, which stared at him with the stiffness in the shoulders of one who had been caught doing something wrong. Fear wasn't exactly what he expressed, but there was a certain feeling that Woojin couldn't define. And at the moment he wouldn't, wasn't relevant.

 

"What do you want?"

“How did you know I was here?” Woojin took a deep breath, knowing that the conversation, just by the way it had started, would extend beyond what he was willing for that day. It wasn't exactly too early, but not so late, just definitely inconvenient for visitors.

"I saw you through the window." He lied, obviously. _"What do you want?"_

"Work" Jisung cleared his throat, raising his wrist so that Woojin could see the jumble of files he was carrying. The soldier then opened the door a little wider, enough for his body to go through and take the files from his colleague's hands. “It must have hurt a lot”

 

Two things conflicted with Woojin's interests, and for a while, he gave in to the quickest and easiest to resolve. He followed Jisung's eyes to his rib-back, where the absence of his shirt made the scar evident. It didn't resemble a bite or a cut. The shape was strange and clearly hadn't healed very well, and just because it didn't fade away like the poisonous cut in his palm Woojin was even more bothered by the exposure of his secret. Indirectly.

 

"Well, you've done what you had to do, goo-" He tried to get back inside, but was stopping by the other who rushedly crossed his path, a little faster than he would use to stop him in those conditions, going on toward the interior of Woojin's home. Woojin had nothing to hide but the fact that everything was happily hidden in his head. "Jisung," he scolded with an unhappy growl, closing the door since clearly scolding him would make no difference.

“Oh”

 

Woojin slammed the door, fully aware of his strength not to break it; but even if he was sure about Chan's knowledge of his third presence in the environment, it would eventually serve as a warning that the still-open matter should be closed down there. Not that there had indeed been any relevant talk about the current situation from the moment they had wakeup to the present, but rather prevention than remedy. Woojin was sure precaution wasn't a gift.

 

“My bad, man, I didn't know you have company” Jisung put a hand to the back of his neck, not looking really embarrassed for simply invading the privacy of someone who was nothing but a co-worker. At least that was what Woojin used to define their relationship, no matter how inconvenient it was.

 

Chan kept the cup close to his mouth, having gone from his neutral point in the kitchen toward the counter that gave him a broader view of the entrance. His face was turned to Jisung and there was no threat there; and as they should be, fearing was sometimes a common and unconscious reaction.

Woojin had been considering certain things for some time. It wasn't as if he had known Jisung for years or anything, with the youngest recruit being transferred to his area about six months ago and his flamboyant manner ended up taking them into their current situation, without him knowing how to react through the curiosity of others. What had caught his attention, however, was that Chan wasn't usually so receptive to people invading their most personal moments. It was okay that there was nothing wrong with the whole picture, but his shoulders weren't tense and his expression didn't betray his distrust and irritation. If he felt anything but understanding and peacefulness, Woojin couldn't really point - and that irrelevant detail usually took on really annoying proportions in his head.

 

"Hm, I know you" Jisung smiled, completely ignoring Woojin's gaze toward Chan, who however much hadn't necessarily moved at that time, had now turned his attention to the soldier still near the door. “You let my dog run away”

"If he was yours, how did it become my fault?"

“And how long has it been?” Puzzled only, Woojin interrupted a possible discussion - because clearly Jisung would defend his point of view in which he was uninterested in listening - as he left his position back in the kitchen, convinced that he would need something to occupy his mouth, inclined to listen more than he needed and not what he didn't want.

“Two days?” Chan raised his eyebrows, licking his lips. "Not so long ago."

“Chan, isn't it?” Jisung took the liberty of approaching from the opposite side of the counter, resting his forearms on the surface while Woojin poured himself a cup of cold coffee; and the taste didn't matter, it was bad anyway in his conception. “I had no idea you guys knew each other too,” Jisung gestured, moving from one to the other, which looked great in their own companies before he arrived. “Woojin never looked very, well, _vampire friendly_ ”

“Work is work, I don't have to be friendly with anyone. Not even with you. ”

 

Normally Chan would scold him for this way of treating someone who tried to be friendly, but Woojin was more noticeable than that, and the vampire's silence carried far more than just discomfort at the realization of his co-worker. Jisung was no angel, in fact, he had been behaving in a way that led Woojin to distrust his promotion to his department, but still not enough to take action about that. But perhaps that was the line that crossed from one thing to another. He avoided mixing his personal life with his field, no matter how homogeneous it had seemed in recent years. The question was precisely that, where Jisung shouldn't be there for any plausible reason for coexistence. They weren't neighbors, they weren't friends, they barely knew each other and all he knew was what files and words let him know.

 

"I get it." Jisung nodded and for a moment Woojin thought to counter that no, he hadn't understood as much as it seemed. He looked around one more time and smiled normally. "But I have a message and you didn't even open what I handed you -"

"I've been working on this for years, what kind of instruction would you have to give me that I didn't already know?"

 

Jisung rolled his eyes and Woojin took a deep breath, lucky as Chan quietly moved toward him to nip him lightly on the hip, finally seeming to have come out of his stillness to try to keep the soldier ironically in place. With his feet firmly on the floor and his hand around the cool cup, avoiding further disaster than the other's body heat having raised even the slightest temperature of the badly touched drink.

 

"Jisung, what are you hiding from me?" Woojin asked more calmly, dropping the drink on the table to search for the file - which, unfortunately to his inattention, had been left by the door and out of reach at first.

 

He moved with less haste than the situation demanded, still with his back to the other two, loosening the elasticity of the briefcase and rummaging through the files inside; There was nothing there that Woojin could no longer identify effortlessly, his eyes going over key words summoning him to his first field assignment in a while. They were no longer his favorites and it was likely that the whole of the current situation would make a single round a disaster; but although the document began to be standardized, the red stamp indicated something that this was no longer a frequent case. Looking at the address of the last attack, as always initially on the top of the file, he held his breath and held the page a little more tightly.

They didn't see every day a house with a number as specific as 66D.

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments, theories and constructive criticism are always welcome
> 
> I hope y'all have fun on holidays and have a great 2020 <3


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The house wasn't protected as he thought it was last time. It was open for any kind of attack, ready to be put down in a single breath.

 

 

 

 **W** oojin placed his fingertips over one temple, reading more closely the files scattered on the kitchen counter even though he was still much more inclined to do any other thing, but Jisung didn't seem to notice. He picked up key words trying to pull them together without really being able to let go of the movement between the walls of his own house or the tension that still existed about the only two bodies remaining in the same room. In that case, Chan had politely withdrawn with respect to the business matter, but Woojin knew that his shoulder against the closed bedroom door carried the same kind of curiosity and anxiety that Jisung expressed for different reasons - or not, after all, Woojin still had too many questions stuck in his throat and less secure conclusions in his hands.

He gave up shortly afterward, closing the folder and pushing it away with his fingertips, his incisive eyes redirected to his co-worker, but with no further observation of what he had been able to digest. In short, not much. He spent many of those minutes concentrating on photographs of the overturned environment, realizing the absence of mention of victims in the report or much of what during his visit Woojin considered the essence of its owner. The shelves were half empty, plants, vases and crystals completely gone. It was a normal house; ignoring the most obvious trail of attack he had ever witnessed. Werewolves aren't usually discreet, but it felt as if this particular one sent a warning.

He had a theory, but it wasn't with Jisung that it would be discussed.

 

"The vampires will come to the house with us tomorrow." He straightened his jacket under Woojin's full attention, who also seemed to have taken some time to assimilate the information. Chan fidgeted from where he was, his back to the corridor.

"And what do they have to do over there?"

“If anyone lived there, they can catch that person's tracks.” Jisung was right and Woojin only depersonalized for a few seconds, still with one foot behind the curtains. Seungmin had fled, it was settled in the soldier's mind and everything he still thought he knew about the warlock; but his subconscious, as honest as it was, wished he were dead as the law of return commanded.

"Tell them it won't be necessary -"

“I'm not allowed to do this”

"But I am the one who gave the command, you just send the message, isn't that exactly what you came here for?"

 

Jisung shifted his weight from one leg to the other, his tongue streaking through his teeth as if searching beneath his for words that wouldn't come out. His eyes searched the corner for something unidentified and then he placed his chest on the counter, his voice eighth lower to not highlight whatever his point was. Woojin suspected it was about Chan, but only because Jisung was relatively predictable - and stupid to believe that any effort would make the least difference in preventing them from being heard by the focus of the new discussion.

 

"What are you two?" Woojin raised his eyebrows, confused. "You and the gothic vampire?"

"At least it was nothing with the Addams family this time -"

“This is serious.” Jisung crossed the counter as soon as Woojin turned his back on him, considering that topic less important than the coffee he hadn't had drunk yet. It was a tiring day. "He was being followed when we met –"

"What?"

 

The soldier stopped, finally having his attention captured again by Jisung's words, but not knowing exactly how to react to them. Chan wasn't defenseless and usually not inattentive either. They had gone through enough satisfying things to learn not to let their guard down — as much as that still applied much more to himself than to the other. He was discredited by the information, and this time he didn't seem to be able to make up his indifference so well, he was expressive as if each of his doubts were written in neon on his forehead.

 

“There were three teenagers behind him and -“

“He is a teacher, works in a teacher district, exactly where it's expected to have students and most of them underage kids.” Woojin propped his hip back on the sink, having forgotten his goals now that he felt more than awake. "What kind of threat teens could be?”

"They weren't vampires"

 

Of course, they were separate situations. Woojin hadn't been in school long enough to not recognize yet how they had been adapted to the much more present situations in the last five years than in the ten years that he had known Chan — a guess since he couldn't remember exactly when had happened. Segregation didn't hit him and he keep pretended not to see it as his priorities changed by necessity; Woojin couldn't say that he wasn't empathetic, only that he was performing his duties in society very poorly as part of it. Or very well as a weapon against what was now his own kind.

 

"Why would humans be so close to their neighborhood?"

“And why were _you_ there?” Jisung pursed his lips and Woojin sighed. “Measure the questions you ask, you're so suspicious of being in the same place, in case something happens, than fifteen-year-olds.” It wasn't exactly a reprisal, just a piece of advice. "Were they armed?"

“No, but –“

"With drugs?"

"No"

"So the only proof of a threat is your words and they have no value"

 

Unfortunately, even though his co-worker's anxiety put a flea behind his ear with a similar result to the vampire in his room - he could hear Chan's bare feet sliding across the carpet - Woojin still didn't think it was a reason for a warning. And if that were the case, there was still not much that could be done if it didn't require Chan to pay more attention around him the way he could, without surrendering the paranoia of the situation. As if the weight of what had happened between them and Seungmin was no longer enough; something he could never let slip as easily through his fingers as it seemed to be. Woojin didn't have so many arms to hold such a damaged structure around his shoulders. How could everything have gotten so bad so fast?

 

“You are working too hard,” he contended, as he had been doing in his most automatic defense. “You should ask for an extra break, I won't need your help tomorrow”

 

Jisung chewed the inside of his cheeks and sighed, his arms untied until his wrists collapsed at his hip, a clear acceptance that he couldn't argue with someone like Woojin. Not by hierarchy, but by sheer stubbornness. That was the way it was, and Woojin didn't make a point of correcting himself, the farther Jisung stayed on certain matters, the better - he just had to restrain himself from becoming overprotective with someone who had chosen to risk all he had. It was what the quarters demanded, their lives for a majority not so happy to be alive. Humans just didn't want to share space with anything outside their circle of peers.

Woojin didn't take him to the door when he left, nor did Chan leave the room; At least it wasn't necessary for him to pass Jisung's message after he crossed the garden and disappeared through the streets. It took a while for Woojin to move again, walking down the hallway not expecting to be greeted by the vampire who had been sitting on the bed for a few good minutes, with no prospect of stand. He leaned against the doorframe, his hands in his pants pockets and his eyes focused on those of Chan that stared back at him, empty, only aware of his presence in the environment.

 

"It was in his car that we drove to Seungmin's house, didn't it?" Chan asked after an exhausting silence, lowering his face toward his hands. “When did you stop being so careful?” He moved his wrists then, rubbing them over his temples compulsively.

“That's the least of the worries—”

"Would you rather pretend nothing happened now or will you tell me exactly how it was that day?"

 

It wasn't precisely a question demanding an answer, it was already implied by every gesture of Chan, the stress evident between his eyebrows and the way he ran his fingers through his messy hair. He was worried, he was always demonstrating far more of his limits than Woojin was really capable of, but that was the way he gave himself up to his weaknesses and couldn't come to the definition of the problem. Woojin was beginning to think that asking for Jisung's help had been a bad idea at the beginning, but he couldn't predict that he would be so constant in things he shouldn't. Or that at some point he had to go through a roller coaster of things where the top was the least scary part. He was sitting on the side of the real reason for his frustrations and agonies all the time, he couldn't shake off what was already part of him.

 

“He used my blood to understand the motives of that crazy wolf that put me in this whole situation.” Woojin brought his fingertips to his forehead and crossed his arms, having a thousand reasons to feel as if the headache comes from the temples to the curvature of his jaw "That's how he poisoned me"

 

He had obviously left out Seungmin's other attempts to hurt him, which were not really relevant at the moment. Apart from those details, it was also obvious to Woojin that just one information was enough to make Chan feel bad about giving him the whereabouts of the warlock, even if he himself had asked in the least fair way possible. And if it wasn't for the vampire delivering the address, it wasn't as if he couldn't find it alone, Chan just offered him the easiest way to the goal. If they owed him favors, he would charge them until he had no choice but using his own hands.

 

"Is that why you dismissed the vampires?"

“No, not really” Chan took a deep breath, his hands now propped against the crook of his shoulders, no longer relieved but complacent, after all, Jisung was still a problem that Woojin hoped to deal with by luck only.

 

He backed away from the door, guiding the noisiest footsteps by his heavy body toward the bed, still keeping some distance considered safe from the other. The silence wasn't uncommon between them, at that moment just a little thicker and more curious on both sides. Woojin couldn't focus so well when Chan looked so _alive._ So concrete, palpable, sensitive to all his senses. He could see in his own skin the rain of complex feelings that weren't and would not be put into words. All that didn't really need to be announced - Chan was scared, Woojin knew he should be too.

 

"Do you really think anything would have happened if he hadn't shown up?"

"Who?"

"Jisung"

"No"

 

Woojin's voice carried far more certainty than his thoughts, avoiding too much to wonder how much within the danger parameter Chan was without his presence. It was something that hadn't been on the agenda for years, after all, they were adults and somewhat protected by laws - even though the practice was much more in his favor than Chan's. They were monsters, leeches, profiteers. There was no possibility of being the victim when they were accused of being the first to attack. Perhaps Woojin was no longer so clear in his own answer.

 

"I think I need more details," Woojin indicated, bending one leg over the mattress while his body remained turned, as if guided by a magnet, toward Chan. “I already did my part”

"Nothing much happened." The vampire licked his fangs, tracing them over his lower lip shortly thereafter. He was still nervous. “He seemed to have lost his dog, talked with me and left”

"There's something you're not telling me"

"How are you sure about that?"

 

Woojin had no idea. It was an impression, he just threw a bait. He was never sensitive enough to understand someone's intentions so well, but about the vampire, everything always seemed clear as water. Probably because of his inability to control such visible emotions or because he knew him long enough to tell each of his habits and what led him to believe that there would always be a chasm covered with thin veils between them. The reasons for not being honest were varied.

 

"If I had been wrong you would have just disagreed with me," he concluded, seeming to have won the argument no matter how unreasonable it was under the circumstances.

“He offered to take me home, but I refused”

“I expected worse”

 

Chan rose abruptly with a disgruntled growl from the back of his throat, no longer peaceful - and if he didn't know him so well, Woojin would have withdrawn his most recent words. But in fact, he hoped for something more worrying than Jisung trying to act protectively against someone he barely knew. Maybe it just wasn't the best tactic, but it wouldn't come as a surprise coming from someone who Woojin knew that had rigged their initiation into a suicide training program.

 

"I don't know why I'm still trying" Woojin knew exactly how it would end and could have finished the discussion with a few words that made Chan forget long enough all the headache that was delivered to his door, but it took too much time for him to act on. The speech was ready when he was still wondering about Seungmin and his own empty stomach. "You don't understand, in fact, you don't even make the effort to do it, because it's not you that is all the time pointed to as a threat -"

“You're being dramatic—”

“No, I'm not.” As Woojin had barely moved for the next few minutes, Chan knew exactly where to redirect his words and the impact they would have. “I may seem like the last priority person to talk about it, Woojin, but we're not in a fairy tale. You were never the hero and nothing was ever really well. My place will be yours as soon as they find out what you are and you will feel on the skin what it's like to be protected on paper and threatened with every step you take. It was my inattention and it could have cost the whole damn thing of my existence. What is so hard for you to understand? Humans are not good and if they have a second of mercy it wouldn't be given to me! ”

“Teenagers, Chan, what could they do to you? Laugh at your ridiculous fashion sense? ”

“You were this age at some point, you remember as well as I do,” Woojin snorted, putting his face between his palms, swallowing any desire to end the conversation and get away from the troubles that were piling up; and not in the diplomatic way he usually tried to resolve when it came to Chan. It probably wouldn't make a real difference if he tried to talk, his brain no longer making a common-sense pact with what really came out of his mouth. It would make things worse, he knew that. “And you weren't so 'grown-up' when you set innocent witches on fire”

“You know why I did that—”

"Don't give me that shit excuse again, we both know you can only look at yourself." He cut off, his mouth dry and his fists clenched. “I know how to defend myself because if I needed you again I would be dead”

“Enough, Chan.” Woojin stood, the obvious effort not to be aggressive as the deepest breath given so far seemed to burn his lungs and twist his stomach. Still, he felt safe to not hurt him, aware of the lock that prevented it, as much as he couldn't name the most obvious obstacle to losing control. “You are just stressed and that's it. “

 

Chan moved his eyebrows beneath his bangs, swallowing hard any argument he had for countering Woojin's reprimand, which made the other aware that this story would yield far more chapters than he was willing to follow. Maybe he should review his steps until now, maybe rethink everything he was told - but it seemed like a waste of time and the clock would keep spinning, the world won't stop just because someone had accused him of something he was so deeply aware of. Chan was right about something, Woojin wasn't and had never been a hero, he had never even behaved like a savior.

 

“I wish for a moment that I don't have to think about which of us will still be alive by the end of the day.”

 

Woojin didn't stop Chan from leaving this time.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Woojin had arrived much later than the scheduled time, the front of the house infested of people who he usually saw only once every two months. His head ached and he felt restless as if something had been missing all day, not being so different by dawn - he had the impression that having someone safely share the same space from his bed two nights earlier had influenced the way he had passed through the weekend. The poisoning was no longer his greatest concern, though perhaps he could consider all his last impulses to be the direct effect of the wolfsbane that had been running through his veins for so long.

He still wasn't sure how far he could continue to blame Seungmin. A migraine wasn't so strong, it didn't resemble the intense abstinence of something Woojin felt he needed, he just didn't know what it was. His anxiety crawled down his throat, his hands sweating a lot when he needed to tighten his sunglasses a little harder over the bridge of his nose. It was late afternoon, but everything around him sounded a little too much. The clarity, the scents, the power with which the monster within his chest struggled for the unidentified but aggressive and dangerous essence. It was still a warning, even if he could tell that for good miles nothing really was a threat. He knew everyone there and could foresee their intentions as if he had in his palm every heart with faulty, nervous beats.

Woojin left less quickly than those who followed him along the way, slamming the car door much harder than he thought that was necessary - none of that premeditated. It seemed to him that the closeness to the full moon caused that kind of physical and psychological uncontrollability again, where not acting on impulse became a test of resistance, a tug of war between keeping up and just giving up what he wasn't sure of the reason to keep. Woojin crossed the garden with fresh memories, the wooden floor inside creaking like never before with so much undivided weight on its structure. There were no vampires around, and perhaps that's why every human had their shoulders tense and their hands closest to the weapons they carried - twice of the standard equipment used only for emergency.

Apart from the context in which the house had been handed over to him in the document taken by Jisung - another reason why his concern had halved - some things remained the same. The cracked facade, the sick tone of the house now that he saw it from a morning perspective. The windows remained blocked by wood, the flowers in the vase seemed to have died unnaturally; they were crushed in the parched grass, some petals squeezed by hurried feet on the short path to the door. Woojin took his own time, trying to capture as much as he could despite the noise and overly alarmed movement.

The farther into the room, the more he could reinforce that Seungmin had been smart enough to predict how it would end - wolves weren't a peaceful team, torn between good and bad cops. In fact, messing with everything that involved their nature and ancestry was too risky even for those in charge of those creatures on a governmental level. Much wasn't known beyond the fact that they were traditional, no one had ever come back to say how they behaved with each other or how they dealt with those who came outside with the premise of an illusory peace. Since the beginning, the goal was to kill them and not understand them. The attack itself was just another sign that they weren't seeking to be understood, Woojin had the feeling that they were looking for what looked for them before. He could still smell his own blood under the loose boards, and he was sure others of his kind could do the same.

A bad sign; nothing really surprising.

 

"No one would be stupid enough to attack an empty house, Juyeon." Woojin paced the few rooms, listening so close to the bathroom the voice of one of his co-workers that he didn't necessarily care about who it was. “There was no personal object when we arrived, no blood, nothing -”

“You know how those demons look like sniffer dogs –”

"But the dogs themselves didn't find anything either." Finally, something positive, after all, Woojin knew just how effective the guard dogs were, or at least thought they were when he wasn't quite aware of their abilities. "What if it was one of them?"

“Bullshit, werewolves don't live in society”

“But we are in the middle of nowhere”

“Since when can anyone hold a cup with paws?”

 

Woojin rolled his eyes, his arms crossed, and an immense urge to counteract the ignorance of the speaker, but he didn't really give in to his more "smart-ass" side. He himself wasn't quite clear about how things worked and didn't remember his times as a training soldier. So far he didn't know how much the transformation was necessary for a werewolf but he could tell that the more days went by, the more complicated it was without succumb. Those born with such a curse may never have seen a man on both legs, just as perhaps those who have been transformed haven't been able to get through it. Woojin was getting tense, but not for the same reason as everyone around him.

And the conversation would surely have earned him more of those doubts he had never really entertained before if he hadn't noticed a strange movement over the territory. Something that provoked his aggression and bothered his breathing, made his fingertips tingle and his heart beat even faster - if it seemed possible. Woojin looked around, the windows dimly lit even though there were traces of tree movements on the floor. The back door of the house, which Woojin didn't even remember existed, banged with the wind and no one seemed to worry about how unusual the calm of the place was. The storm hadn't completely passed, they always came back and anyone in their right mind should be protected.

He returned to the living room, the small fireplace still full of ashes and a hand-painted picture destroyed by sharp claws - but not really a sign of anything. As a child Seungmin had a habit of drawing everything he saw and constantly created magical sigils for whatever his greatest desire was. Sometimes it was to circumvent a creative block, sometimes it was to win in a card game. Realizing the surroundings again, Woojin missed any seal, either behind the door or hidden in the corner of the closet. The house wasn't protected as he thought it was last time. It was open for any kind of attack, ready to be put down in a single breath.

The front door slammed closer, echoing for a while between the walls in which everyone fell silent. A part of the team headed for the backyard, Woojin following the flow of no more than three people - excluding himself - but lost sight of what they were looking at, the forest not really catching his attention when he heard the sound of the droughts leaves cracking, an animalistic breath under the bedroom window on the right, and a mutual recognition of the enemy. Woojin put his hand on the weapon in his waist, matching his footsteps with that of the large creature, but his reflection wasn't as sharp as it advanced with the claws craving for his neck and one hand for his wrist.

It wasn't even close to what he was used to dealing with. Woojin had rarely seen werewolves without a complete transformation, with their contorted faces and their deformed bodies, usually attacking over two-meter-long wolves with sharp fangs and reddened gums. That thing was far from pleasant to looked at so closely. Its drawn mouth seemed carried more teeth than he thought a human could do, while its hairy face and golden irises intimidated the soldier in a bloodthirstily way. Apparently, at that stage, the sclera of the eyes darkened to protect them from where the eyelids were absent. Woojin could feel the slimy saliva of the lycanthrope running down its mouth, splashing very close to his collarbone. The odor was horrible, to say the least.

Woojin knew that attracting attention was a bad idea, no matter how relatively exposed they were in that situation. The other's aggressiveness had stoked his own and he felt his unformed claws clutch at the werewolf's muscular forearm, but still far enough away from the body whose arms were larger than their legs, which served no more than to hold the monster standing. Woojin didn't feel the ground so close, nor did it seem that it was actually squeezing his throat - just holding him there, wanting something, but unable to say a word. By the proximity he felt its vibrate, the snarling arrested avoiding calling the rest of the team. Idiots and useless. How were they letting an anthropomorphic creature pass in front of the terrain they were supposed to be watching?

 

_Foolish humans, always go through the woods._

 

Woojin moved the left-hander, trying not to let go of the weapon he still held. Something prevented him from firing, from bringing back the team that thought the bottom of the lot was far more dangerous than any other direction. They were wild, they wouldn't come down by the street. He had far less time to decide what to do than what he was really giving, and the lycanthrope moved so little, curious about something he couldn't identify.

Until he realized that his glasses had been on the floor for some time, crushed by the creature's disfigured foot.

 

" _You._ " He could hear from a low growl, completely redirected to the sensitivity of his ears. The saliva now over his shoulder, almost burning. " _Traitor_ "

 

He blew out a thick breath, hampered by the hand on his neck. His eyes darted over the angle between the werewolf's arm and trunk, seeing the broken fence near the sidewalk. Woojin knew that there was a minimal chance of getting rid of it - for not having surrendered the transformation he didn't have the strength of an animal like that, and he wasn't sure if pushing them would result in a plausible angle for the fall to generate even minimal damage. He needed a distraction, something to make the werewolf forget about holding a cornered fang, or rather a traitor.

 

"I'm not - one - of you," Woojin replied with more pauses than he would have liked, trying to find a balance between his whole body already aching from supporting his neck and his arm over the werewolf's, which soothed the feeling that his head could be torn off at any moment.

" _Traitor_ " The creature repeated, venomously. " _Kill. Traitor. Pack. Blood."_

 

For a good connoisseur, half-words were enough to identify what would follow. Woojin couldn't let an omega call his pack, scream for his alpha to earn some prestige for finding what they should still be looking for - something told him that it wasn't all about him being a werewolf now on the side of those who wanted the death of his kind. He knew he was being recognized for his blood on the floor of that house, the same blood that had a connection with the one who had originated it. He should have asked a few questions before asked Jisung for that damn beta head.

It was time to act, even if it could make his throat open through the claws so close to his veins. His secret seemed more important, desperation burning in his stomach and causing sweat to run down his cold spine. The werewolf raised its head, ready to howl as Woojin threw one of his legs over its arm, hooking the inside of his knee to the creature's neck and using the opposite foot on the wall to exert the force necessary to knock them down. Within seconds, he swung the weapon from one hand to the other on the time that the lycanthrope stops the pressure on his wrist, without questioning the need to pull the trigger when he just starts to shooting between the animal's eyes. One, two, three times. The hand still on his neck loosened, the claws sticking out of his skin without he even realizing the way they were holding him, the warm blood running down the lawn where his back was resting.

Woojin didn't care if he had attracted attention. He closed his eyes for a few seconds, wondering if the fight was worth it when it was just the first of so many.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> T.W .: School shooting
> 
> This is a very important chapter and one that I was afraid to write about if it wasn't going to have implications in the future. I'll divide it into two parts and there will be T.W. in both, just in case. I could have made it unspecific if I hadn't realized that dealing with the subject still sounds absurd, no matter how often it still happens.   
> The thing is that I frequently talk about social and political problems and this is one of them. It's the extreme of an accumulation of negative things in our society and it's still treated as if it doesn't need to be discussed with such force elsewhere in the world outside North America. I believe that the more we consciously talk about it, the more we can come with conclusions capable of stopping this from happening anywhere. (And it's quite obvious that it isn't by arming up teachers that this will happen. There is no fire against fire beneficial to anyone.)   
> For those who didn't know, I live in Brazil, where guns are legally prohibited and there are (although Bolsonaro) still a strong bureaucracy to have a gun at home with the permission of law. Yet just last year we had two shootings in schools reported in the last semester, one of them in the state where I live. We don't talk about that here. We don't teach how to protect yourself in environments like this, because believe it or not the school is safer than the streets.   
> When I wrote this, I visited reports, testimonials, and recommendations from professionals about what to do in those moments. I'm not the voice of reason, but I will leave some important things at the end of the chapter.   
> Stay safe.

 

 

 

  **H** e crashed the car door, not bothering to say goodbye to the driver when he just wanted to walk through the door and throw himself on the parquet floor where he would stay for the next few hours. Woojin knew - and partly because he felt it - that the wound on his neck was gone and he just kept his hand on the dressing because, in theory, he should be feeling pain in the eyes of someone who had no idea that it didn't cause too much damage for a long time.

He would lie if he said he didn't spend much of his day thinking about that unhappy encounter with whoever wanted to kill him for what he hadn't done - or at least the creature didn't seem to be aiming for the right reason for what, in this case, Woojin would also go want his own neck. He would understand much better if it was betrayal by species or something alike, but it was clear that it was something coming from the wolf that had crossed his path with he never really thought about knowing his name. If there was indeed one.

At that point, he had more questions than answers and very little chance of getting them. If the beta didn't have a pack, there was nowhere to turn. Not knowing how to communicate with three-meter wolves was a problem for another moment and Woojin felt that it was, of all, the easiest to solve. There was no possibility of giving in to a complete transformation without transcending to the type of communication they used and that humans were unaware of. Perhaps that was another relevant point to find the whole situation strange, unusual. Werewolves didn't speak their language regardless of the form in which they presented themselves, all they could commonly hear were animal snarls and grunts, in which one was able to identify a threat because it was the most natural of the relationship among the species.

Looking from that angle, he knew far less than he would expect from someone trying to fight something. The functional information was minimal, in short, physical weaknesses and for what they are attracted, traps were almost always used to catch a loose wolf or small packs without territory. Since they weren't trying to dialogue, gather and exterminate was the biggest command and it was likely that affected Woojin's conception of things he currently wished he knew beforehand. Wolves didn't care about their species, but about their allies, similar within the same pack. Nor do they usually care if the message would be understood clearly, but they seemed to know when someone understood them. At the time, Woojin didn't know whether being bitten had affected his ability to "translate" what the werewolf had to say.

Since there were no reports of accepting or not those transformed into their packs, it was also not possible to say whether they understood any language other than the subliminal code of the sound of a firearm. Woojin had no way of finding out if they understood every word he said in the language in which he had grown up. It was obvious that werewolves had their own noises and their own line of reasoning, which made it much more difficult. They were wild, more dangerous than the dead natives of each region currently inhabited. Exterminating people with different cultures had always been easier as long as they didn't have a physical and resilient superiority. It took years for indigenous people to have no space and to become extinct. Their native languages warped by the pleasure of the ears of the dominant. It was like that with those who didn't follow the rules, it would be like that with him as it always was with Chan and he had never listened.

In fact, it was another point that had taken up much of Woojin's attention for the same moment. As much as he made it clear in his position on what was presented to him by Jisung, the discomfort in his subconscious persisted, instinctively putting him with tense shoulders and the inability to close his eyes at night. All he could think about was how far Chan was from what he considered safe, even if they were individuals and so it was common for them not to share the same space for more than a few hours - he didn't even think it would work out that well. They had distanced themselves for the past few years, but even more within a few months. That dispute over who was right came from before the bite, from before the curve became much narrower. And Woojin knew that most of the time he was wrong, he was too stubborn to admit that he had been commenting on one mistake after another that not only hurt him but clearly ended up hitting those who had less to do with his choices.

It was an old relationship and the only one that hadn't collapsed, but it seemed like a matter of time. If a lot or a little, he couldn't say. As "natural enemies" Woojin could point out that he was fueling a revulsion for vampires that was always within an acceptable line of doubt about them. He had helped to integrate the species into society, within the place where he worked, around his field of activity. They were everywhere because at some point in his life he had collaborated so that they would be part of his daily life. His human self never felt threatened by them as his wolf self seemed to want distance from what could theoretically sap his vitality. On the other hand, he was unable to detach himself from Chan as a sensory figure at specific times. He was a safe presence, his support, his sanity.

Chan was his family. Chan was becoming part of his pack, the first to be identified as essential regardless of how he felt about his species.

Woojin barely noticed the moment the car had left and he kept standing in front of the door, his hand over his brown hair and his eyes closed in the daylight. He had spent the night in the quarters, taking care of the scratch on his neck - it was difficult to cover to the time when the skin regenerated until at the end of the dressing when everything became a superficial scratch with more blood than would normally happen in a daily situation. He was exhausted, but not as much in the physical as he thought he should be. The situation in which he needed to spend so much energy was even more resilient; which also caused him to eat as if he were preparing for a long hibernation.

For a while, he decided not to enter. He sat on the first steps of the house and closed his eyes, the bandage on his neck bothering much more than it should have, probably because there was no longer a need for it to be there. The more time passed, the more the sun burned his scalp and sweat ran down the back of his neck towards the collar of his shirt. His already hot body was possibly capable of frying a beef in the palm of his hand. And even in that situation where absolutely nothing happened, Woojin felt anxious, aware that something was coming that he wasn't sure what it was about. Although calm, he remained restless. He felt everything and nothing at the same time. The anxiety that was driving a path already known in his throat was there all the time. There was no morphine capable of taking all that sticky sensation out of what he couldn't name.

He grunted, opening his eyes to hear hurried steps in slippers smashing the sidewalk. Too high, coming in his direction. Jeongin was panting, his arms folded as he was trying to run like a marathon athlete. There was no bicycle this time, just his skinny legs trying to keep his child's body balanced while he swerved from the concrete to Woojin's unkempt garden. The soldier put his hands together in front of his chest, his forearms resting on his knees as he watched the boy recover from a run he didn't think was really necessary, after all, he wouldn't go anywhere.

 

"Mr. Kim!" Jeongin called a little before he managed to reach him, placing his hands on his knees. He wore the uniform of the school closest to that region, but he didn't seem in a hurry to introduce himself to his classes. "You - You have to come with me -" Jeongin interrupted himself all the time, taking the liberty of holding Woojin by the wrist to try to lift him, without much success. The older patiently placed his hand over the other's, releasing with ease the thin fingers hooked on him.

"First, take a deep breath, the world will not end" For the general misfortune, he imagined. "Second, shouldn't you be in school?"

"You have to come with me"

 

Completely ignoring Woojin's first warning, not so discreet, when he clarified that it was better if Jeongin didn't touch him, the boy took him by the arm again, trying at all costs to force him out of his position. Unwilling to go on with that, Woojin stood up, but without taking any steps in the direction he believed Jeongin wanted him to go. It wasn't really a lack of willpower to act up and help anyone who was clearly not there to ask him a friendly favor. Or simply to upset him, since Jeongin had never been the type to give his neighbors a headache, at most to his parents when he had a very pure view of anyone. Something was wrong, but so far he wasn't so sure if there was also something right, in its proper place.

 

"Can you tell me what happened first?" Woojin was in no hurry. When he started walking, he checked only the presence of the keys in the back pocket of his pants, letting Jeongin take the position of anxiety that until recently occupied his head. He could, and he knew he should, listen to the boy more.

"We have to go fast -"

"Jeongin, I'm not going anywhere if you don't tell me what the hell happened"

 

The boy stopped, shifting his body weight on his heels, his eyes much more open as Woojin unconsciously raised his voice. The soldier took a deep breath, squeezing the space between his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, trying not to be aggressive towards anyone who didn't need his ignorance at that moment.

 

“Okay, I'm sorry” he asked, perhaps not quite as honestly as he heard each syllable in his own voice. "Tell me what happened and then I can help you -"

"They said horrible things, Mr Kim" Jeongin started, the words moist, a little tangled as he was letting the information out with some dread "I had heard the older ones saying that vampires are just leeches, my parents say that all the time -" Woojin knew, he had already heard things that he hoped Jeongin didn’t have contact with from his own family members “But they said they would 'send them to where they deserved to be' -“

"They who, Jeongin?"

"The older boys at school, Mr. Kim, they said they were going to send the vampires back to where they came from" Woojin was predicting where it would end, but let him continue, his eyes already shining "And they will start with the children"

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Chan knew it wouldn't be a normal day as soon as he stepped out of his house. His sleep had been strangely alert, restless, even though he hadn't woken up during the exact eight hours in that situation. Unlike the last conversation with Woojin that had made him lose some nights of sleep, this time the vampire didn't seek to think of the other at any time. They were adults and they knew what they were doing, the decisions they were making. They had been forced to mature a long time ago, regardless if sometimes the strange desire to pretend to be a child returned, to see the world as one. Especially for those who lived so surrounded by them.

Children like his, not necessarily different, but with characteristics definitely foreign to humans, had an equally different way of digesting events around them. Chan taught them to be fully aware of space, to better control all other senses without relying so fully on their eyes - perhaps because he himself can never rely on his vision as a useful sense. Some of those boys and girls saw so little, but still much more than a parcel. Some with all colors, some with others selected by hand by the assorted brain itself. Still, it was a requirement for everyone to discover how to endure existence through their palms, their ears, their nose, the roof of their mouth and the pink papillae of their tongue. So, when it all started, it had been one of them to realize that this was not a normal day at school like other else. Chan had made the mistake of being too concerned about which children's book best matched his reading at his fingertips, in order to start the most basic lessons with the mindset to end them as soon as possible. His head wasn't in place, a lot still occupied the basement of his mind without really having a place to new information without getting rid of the old ones. He ended up keeping a lot for himself, much more than he should have, and none of the drawers clogged with unpleasant issues had been emptied because he was conscious of finding a solution for each one.

 

"Mr. Bang, Mr. Bang!" One of the girls called at the back of the room, raising her hand, aware that her gesture wouldn't go unnoticed regardless of the difficulties. "Someone is popping bombs out of the class"

 

He had dealt with moments of extreme anxiety before. He had already been desperate for a salvation he knew that wouldn't come. Negative feelings weren't exactly unknown to the vampire, but there, at that moment, Chan felt the cold in his spine intensify for all parts of his body, diminishing the sensation of the space around him until he could hear the sound that passed through the thick wall so clearly as if his ear was pressed in one. He knew the sound of shots as if the gun was in his hand. He knew what it was and how to act, but his body didn't match the urgency of his brain to recognize the first signs.

He avoided thinking too much, even though it was inevitable not to try to escape to the safest space in his mind. His safety zone wasn't bulletproof and there was so much to be lost in circumstances like these, where he remembered that he didn't belong to the legends and wasn't immortal at all costs. He lifted the body, taking the nearest children in his arms and indicating, in a tone sufficient for them to hear, to follow him to the cramped cabinet at the back of the room - which hadn't been done for that type of emergency, but that, in a first instance, was his best option.

His hands were shaking when he checked each one, placing his palm over their little heads, all glued together with frightened cries that Chan asked to not be so loud, repeating quickly that everything would be fine. Everything would be fine, it always be, right?

 

"I'll be back in a minute, don't leave here under any circumstances, okay?" He whispered, stroking the hair of the girl who refused to let go of the wrinkled sleeve of his shirt. “Only leave when you hear me say to leave. Everything will be fine, it will be fine ”He repeated, again, like an inefficient mantra that made his mouth more and more bitter.

 

Carefully, but still in a hurry, he pulled the little girl's fingers out of his cloth and stood up, closing the door in which he took seconds more to reach the lock and turn the key. The roots of his hair were sweating, he heard his own breathing louder than the notion he had of the shots in the main hall of the elementary school. He wasn't so sure if he was afraid for my own life, he had risked it before simply because he was born this way, different. Not special. With each shot his shoulders narrowed and time ran, aware of what should be done even though it took a crucial time for each member to receive the message of adrenaline sent by his uncontrolled feelings.

 

_Run, hide, fight._

 

The first option had been ruled out, since the windows were locked and much had to be lost if he tried to open them - it was usually a process carried out during his arrival, but it hadn't been past eight in the morning and on that particular day he regretted not having followed a routine. He tried to follow the steps through the hall, ignoring the churning of his stomach with each loud crack, indicating that the more of the minutes he spent thinking, the less he acted. The children stayed on the first floor for a good reason: they were the first to go out and if mixed with the older ones they could easily be lost in the crowd, but Chan had never thought how disadvantageous it was in circumstances like that. They were trapped and depended on luck to have a mere notion of the tomorrow - and he would extend it as far as he could, even though in the end everyone could die for the same actions he took with the complete opposite of that intention.

He crossed the classroom, turning off the lights and fighting again to lock the door. He tried to control his breathing, not to lose everything just because his heart beat in his ears a little louder than what he should really keep his attention on. With his hands moist with sweat, he started to lift some of the nearest tables, strategically positioning them to block access, regardless if he wasn't so sure more about what he was dealing with – as there was little sense of who the threat was, he believed that an average medium-sized human wouldn't be able to bring down a barrier like that. Chan breathed once, twice, when he took a few steps away to the center of the room.

He could hear screams through the corridors and the beginning of neighboring classes being invaded by the shooter. He didn't want to be there, he didn't want to get out of bed independently if he knew how much his students now depended on his conduct as a professional and as responsible for each life under his supervision. He ran a hand through his hair, feeling the most disturbed strands cling between his fingers for a few moments. He decided that he would spend his, perhaps, last minutes next to them and not alone.

He walked over to the cabinet, unlocking the door to be immediately greeted with soft cries and a wave of fear that surpassed his own. He placed himself between the small space between the children, this time closing the micro space from inside before sitting on the floor, welcoming in his arms as much as he could of his students. He didn't care how they made his shirt sticky or how it made the place more stuffy with their hectic breaths. Chan squinted, feeling the chain around his neck heavier than usual.

He let Vlad protect him from what was to come.

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Run. Hide. Fight.
> 
> My sources on youtube:  
> Just Another Day: How to Survive an Active Shooter Event on Campus  
> Surviving an Active Aggressor  
> Violent Person on Campus: Know You Can Survive


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> T.W .: School shooting (If you prefer, skip to the second part of the chapter)
> 
> It's the second time that I try to post this chapter. I hope things haven't been messed up, however frantic the situation may be. Obviously some things were diverted from reality to the benefit of the plot, but I still tried to be as close to reality as I could, even though it was a fictional story. A lot is also lost during the translation since I write this story in two different languages to post in different sites, and I didn't write the chapter fluidly because my computer went to repair, which can also influence something. I honestly hope not. 
> 
> Anyway, any problem, talk to me, I'm here looking to improve.~

 

 

 

" **A** h, come on," Woojin complained quietly, bracing the phone between his ear and his shoulder, his steps getting faster and faster as if all of his conviction about what had been stamped on his previous arguments was gone in seconds.

 

He was absolutely sure it was temporary - not being able to really think what he thought of everything and ending up emitting things out of his mouth had been frequent, so he knew he had been stupid, he just didn't expect the universe to reciprocate immediately in that way such stupidity. He felt that the situation wasn't the best because of the way something seemed to crawl under his skin, the fear of whatever was carving a fixed mark on his bones. Woojin didn't have the answers for everything and sometimes he ventured to deduce one thing or another. That time everything pointed to the options that he most refused to face, thinking that there could be another, much more concrete solution to his problems.

He tried again, taking the opportunity to reload his weapon on the way with the ammunition still attached to the uniform that he hadn't even bothered to remove; which also implied the unpleasantly strong smell of his own blood on his collar or the splash of the wolf on the hem of his pants. He knew that this wasn't the safest posture in a neighborhood where he didn't belong, but he already had to deal with too much for this to be an extra concern. Jeongin not having left his side was perhaps the thing for which he should have more responsibility, but at some point, he had just forgotten how his shorter legs had a hard time keeping up with him. When he was attended Woojin snorted in stress, returning his fingertips to the phone as he begins to notice the commotion less than two blocks from the school.

 

"112, what's your emergency?" The attendant responded to decorum, her voice calm enough to irritate Woojin and even more the growing anxiety, following the attitude of each cell filled with adrenaline in his body. The closer he got to the school, the more he was able to hear the sound of gunshots, the smell of blood in the distance. He was grateful that Jeongin couldn't have the same impression he had of what was happening. He stopped, looking directly at the boy and his hard breath.

“Jeongin, go home and don't leave. If your parents ask, say you missed time, did you hear me? ” The question didn't really give room for denial, so he didn't insist before returning his attention to the phone. He might as well return the boy's cell phone later, that wasn't a huge deal for him or the other as he saw him walk away, even if hesitant. "This is Commander Kim, from base 0-325 of the red team, code 42" Woojin recited slowly, making sure of Jeongin's distance when he started walking again. “We have a shootout at 419 autoheart street, a school building -“

"Sorry, Mr. Kim, but we don't work with that region -"

"I don't care" He cut off, visibly annoyed that he had already wasted so much time on a state bond. He understood the fears when Jeongin had explained to him the difficulty in believing in a child announcing a tragedy, but he was an officer. Even if not from that district or with such direct interference in the police work in the region. “Listen to me well, okay? Depending on who I decide to report your neglect, we both know that this may be the last call you’re going to answer, so arrange to send two vehicles here before I make this bigger than it needs to be.”

"I will do my best, sir"

"Be quick"

 

He hung up, in time ignoring the voice in the back of his head that insisted on pointing out that the police's inability by that time had already killed a relative number of innocent children and adults. The thought itself made his stomach churn. Working with werewolves distanced him from human nature and made him distinguish one situation from another - killing a wolf in cold blood seemed to be a natural part of the society he lives in and Woojin had learned to hunt large and medium-sized animals from an early age. His grandfather was an excellent hunter, skills that his father had never learned and that is why the divorced couple's only son was the perfect target for the old man to pass it on. Again he was what he was, in part, because his grandfather had given him the bare minimum to survive.

But he knew how he was one in a million of those who knew the sound of the cylinder, the heat of a barrel, the stride on his shoulders when he shoots. He could tell which weapon it was, what the position of the shooter's hands if it weren't for the cloud of agony that covered his eyes and trapped his throat. His first steps were already covered in blood. From the gates he was able to see the teachers who had managed to get out by the windows, carrying as many children as possible in their arms, clinging to each piece of their clothes. Some didn't move, stagnating under the parapet of their classrooms for apprehension that there would be more to fear even in the open field. His priority wasn't to save anyone. Before he could think of helping, he should first get rid of the sniper, limit the chances that the scenario was already worse than what he was able to assess. Woojin denied himself the weight of fear, bowing his back as he walked through the school building's gaping glass doors. He couldn't go back and ask those fleeing his target's whereabouts, it wouldn't give him more time than he really had.

He would lie if he said that that scenario didn't scare him. His mind was empty, but his chest ached, his fingers didn't hide the anguish in as they were unable to relax by pressing hard on the trigger. Each shot was higher than the last, the intensity of the bullet against different obstacles looking five times greater when the shot didn't come in a battlefield. The walls echoed the tragedy throughout the hall and Woojin, at some point, didn't know where to go in the maze of corridors.

He leaned his back on one of the corners and listened. The heart that beat faster among all the others, the hands wet with sweat inside warm leather gloves and rubber shoes on acrylic floors. They came from the left, where the shoulder hit one of the doors with aggressive rhythms, but without being able to move much more than millimeters from the lock. The shooter hadn't yet reached the second floor. The stairway leading to the most advanced classes was clean, unlike all the way there where his own feet marked the floor with blood.

He turned in one, two corridors. His eyes fixed in a single direction, looking for a specific face that didn't belong to that environment. Woojin heard the sound of the lock released, the handle banging against the wood of one of the doors as the sniper struggled to break the lock entirely with the grip of his weapon. The soldier stretched out his wrists and turned, so intent on his target that he couldn't see the mirrored gesture of the six-foot-woman, the disheveled brown hair and the blood-stained face from the periphery of his vision. Contrary to his hesitation. she didn't seem to have thought the same way, shooting the sniper's exposed chest once. The impact made the body fall against the door, the teenager responsible for that attack loosening his grip on the gun bigger than his arms.

 

"Damn" Woojin ran towards the shooter trapped by one of the sleeves tangled in the knob, kicking the used gun away before putting his own backdown, kneeling in front of the human whose has a hand pressed against his own chest, trying to stop the bleeding. "Give it to me" He pointed to the pistol in the woman's hands, which the memory immediately recognized as being the same secretary Kang to pass his message weeks ago.

 

Shaking from head to toe, she tossed the object as far away from her body as possible, raising her hands as if asking for forgiveness for the deed. Woojin felt the space between his fingers moist, the right hand helping to press the hole so close to the teenager's heart. He was furious. Tense, desperate. Woojin didn't really care about the life he was trying to maintain after seeing what he had caused everyone along the way. Part of him encouraged himself to let the boy die. It was the least, that shot was the immediate response to what he had arrived with the intention of doing. But things weren't so simple and someone would pay for the death of someone who didn't appear to be over sixteen, surrounded by bad ideas and implanted ideologies.

There was no mercy against a vampire as there was for a soldier in self-defense.

 

"Here, call the emergency" With the left hand Woojin took Jeongin's cell phone out of his pocket, tossing it back towards the secretary. “Take whoever you can and get out of the building. Now."

 

There was something intense about the whole situation, where the palm of the hand felt the shooter's heartbeat so vividly, the blood trapped under his nails. There was something between his ribs that was pleased to know that a human was losing the tug of war with his life, being held only by the pressure that Woojin was still putting on his chest. Sometimes with too much force, pulling expressions of physical pain and crying from the boy who would soon start asking for his mom.

He heard hurried steps down the corridor in all directions. He felt the eyes of the children behind his back as they left the stairway towards the hall, being guided by the teachers to not look in any other direction than the one they were following, with their heads redirected to the open doors. There were always those who didn't listen. The metallic smell impregnated in each corner should also be a nuisance for them, it was strong as acid in his nostrils, even though blood had never been exactly his food priority - as was the case with the surrounding vampires, more and more focused on getting away. or prevent others from approaching. Impatient with the delay of the police force already called, Woojin used his free hand to pull the hem of his shirt, lifting it over his shoulders and passing it over his head, using the fabric to more accurately compress the sniper's wound.

 

"Hands up!" He heard the shout at the end of the corridor, aware that he couldn't withdraw his attention from what he was doing if that was what the cop seemed to want. The boy's frightened expression, whose a bloody hand was now around his wrist, was enough to understand that even if he wanted to carry out that order he couldn't. The reflection of his blue eyes came from the chain around the teenager's neck, the scratched dog tag stuck between the space of his collarbones. Woojin took a deep breath and closed his eyelids. He only needed a few more seconds.

"You've done enough, I'll take over from here" This time the voice was closer, it was feminine and demanded calm, placing a hand over his on the shooter's chest. Woojin stepped aside, making room for the paramedic while in the automatic he took the pistol left on the floor with his bloody fingers.

 

He stood up feeling as if his body weighed a ton. With one hand on his knee, unconcerned with the dirt around him, Woojin inhaled and exhaled repeatedly, ignoring the sloppy movement of the police around. He was already waiting when one of the officers, perhaps the same one who shouted when he found them, approached with a disgruntled expression to see a “professional colleague” defend the _indefensible_. It wasn't exactly the intention to try to play the hero, as the policeman seemed to imply by his tone of voice.

 

“You guys on the red team always meddle up, don't you? You are everywhere ”Woojin lifted his torso and raised his eyebrows, letting the white-haired man cross his arms over his prominent belly, staring around him as if waiting for an answer. He wouldn't receive any. "Can you tell me what exactly happened?"

"Really? Don't you know how to look around? ”

"You know, you can be arrested if you disrespect me -"

"We both know that you can't" Woojin averted his eyes, the paramedics removing the teenager's body leaving even more traces of blood on the floor. He hadn't seen the displacement of the others wounded and dead, but he was absolutely sure that the difference in treatment should be evident as the sniper was simply a human. He sighed. "He came into the school shooting and I did the job that you should have come to do when I called the first time."

"We don't cover that area, Commander Kim"

"Keep your intolerance for yourself, officer ..." Woojin took a while to read the name on the uniform, stained with fat. "Park."

"So you shot the boy?"

“Did you mean the criminal in question who opened fire at an elementary school? Yes, it was me, and he seemed too mature for a boy when he was holding a gun. ”

"Spare me the speeches, Commander Kim, you know you will have to testify anyway"

 

Of course, Woojin hadn't come to that line of reasoning when he decided to take the blame for what had happened. He hated having to write reports, to hear his superiors dictate to be discreet the next time. He wouldn't be punished for attempted murder, that was certain. He was still part of a protective force with a license to kill, but it didn't usually apply to human affairs and perhaps the efforts to cover up his actions needed to be greater. He lifted his head, relaxing his shoulders as he decided it would be a problem for his future self.

He didn't respond directly, choosing to agree on what the officer said before left, leaving the job of disturbing Woojin with whatever was necessary on the hands of the rest. He looked around, checking the corridor one last time - his shirt had been taken with the paramedics, even though one of them politely offered him one of the blankets redirected to the victims, which he declined. His exposed scar, for now, was the last of his worries. He had handed the bloody gun to the police in what he was able to hide the other in of his boot at some point, relieving anxiety over the woman's thoughtless attitude. With the departure of the officers, the conclusion was reached that, in theory, they had collected both evidence of what had happened.

But above all, Woojin hadn't forgotten the real reason for having gone through all of that. He headed for the closed-door as soon as the movement down the corridor seemed to have slowed, moving the deformed knob in search of the certainty that it was actually locked. He knew who class 9 belonged to, and perhaps that was why the idea that they were safer now than before had made his heart fail and his stomach heavy. It had come too close for something to happen. Another minute and the sniper would have pulled the lockout, invading the room where Woojin could recognize someone. Not alone.

He pushed the door with one shoulder, feeling the barricade of tables stop him. The lights were off and nothing could be heard even if superficially. Woojin stepped back, biting his lower lip hard before ignoring the attention he would get from the police when he landed a kick near the doorknob, violently knocking over the tables and possibly one of the lockers. He passed the body through the small space, looking around the closed windows before finding another door. Semi-open, with small red eyes staring directly into his.

Just above was the face he most wanted to see, safe and sound, keeping the children behind his own body or against his chest, in his arms. Chan straightened up, taking one of the little girls with him who didn't exactly bother to be crushed between the bodies of the adults as soon as Woojin embraced the vampire in a tight hug. With a clean hand, he brought his fingers between Chan's wavy hair, keeping him as close as he could for as long as he thought were necessary to ease the guilt of not having heard him. And much more, the fear that he didn't know he had to lose him because of that.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

Woojin removed the bandage from his neck, throwing it directly into the trash. He rested his palm on the back of his neck, turning his head to the left and then to the right, feeling his muscles ache almost all over his back. He hadn't come home as expected, but he wasn't far from it, looking from another angle. Still, Chan's house looked like it was taken from a book, far from the simplicity and discretion of its facade. The furniture was exquisitely decorated, with gold-edged mirrors and victorian couches. The corridors carried pictures painted in the last century - and he believed that the vast majority of counterfeits - as well as the bathroom was perhaps the part of the house that was a little brighter than the rest. At least, it was the environment in which Woojin could see his reflection more clearly, as he had been avoiding for some time.

He was getting tired again, although it was all due to his need to breathe. Stop for a second, let himself enjoy the feeling of being alive; something that had never crossed his mind in the past four or five years, on average. The feeling was that he had fought many more wars in a single month than in years, and if nothing that had gone before would be able to overcome what was yet to come. Woojin knew that it would all be over in a few days and, in theory, he should feel less anxious about the consequences of his recent actions when he probably wouldn't even have to face them.

Deep down he also knew that his feelings for that moment didn't matter. If he was anxious, scared, nervous, tired, none of that would affect the way things would take after the next full moon. It was just a jumble of confused impressions in a body that might not be able to withstand what fate had in store for it. Woojin didn't even bother to strengthen his psychological in the face of the idea that it could be the end of the line, that death has never been so closer than that day compared to the last 20, at least.

He rested his forehead on his reflection in the mirror, closing his eyes as he waited for whatever was causing such an upset in his stomach to just stop. He was overwhelmed with feelings that didn't belong to him, burying those who should live up to what he always thought he was - just a lost human without many options. He lifted his eyelids, this time to face his open hands in the sink from above, his skin tanned in contrast to white marble, his nails still stained with blood and drops of water lost around the edge.

When the acid sensation went up in his throat and the corners of his eyes burned for a measly second, Woojin could tell precisely how close he was to breaking, how strong he felt like crying over things he had no control over.

These weren't rare moments as it might have seemed. There wasn't much that wouldn't make any soldier cry - but Woojin probably had that mechanism as a greater weakness than he imagined, a limit that he didn't remember having really imposed on himself. There were so many times when he wanted to reduce himself to dust, when the pain was huge compared to what his body could handle alone. The same emotional tension spilled over into physics until it became impossible to keep his knees steady for so long.

 

"Not now" He remembered himself in a whisper, pulling the body away from the furniture before running his hand through his hair, taking advantage of the cue to lightly brush his wrist over his teary eyes. He wouldn't really have all the time in the world, maybe it would take a day or two before he realized how heavy the luggage he was carrying so well before all that history. It wasn't on their deathbed that people most regretted the decisions made in life without necessarily doing something about it?

 

Woojin moved his body across the floor as if it seemed denser than normal, his feet touching the cold floor without really feeling that much of a difference. He turned the doorknob, scratching the door on the floor until his eyes got used to the darkness of the room again. Chan had been lying in bed for just over twenty minutes, long enough for Woojin to be able to remove the seventy-two-hour marks of uncontrollable adrenaline, now transformed into a distressing feeling of despair and emptiness. He turned off the light, counting with the little that came from the street through the window when he approached from the other side of the mattress.

It was only eleven in the morning. Maybe it was even a little earlier, but it didn't really matter. It was better that the curtains remained closed, that the world didn't exist outside those walls. Screaming in a vacuum was tantamount to being silent and at that moment it seemed appropriate that seeing nothing meant being able to see absolutely everything. They understood each other better when they were on the same level. Woojin sat on the bed, bending one leg before without hesitating to place one hand on the vampire's hip, still with back turned for him.

 

"You alright?" He asked, the question sounding repetitive in the last hour. In none of them had Chan been really sincere and knew that, he just didn’t pressure him to put into words a situation that wasn’t comfortable on either side.

"Yes"

 

Woojin felt the cold hand on his now warm one, the fingers well serving the space between his. It was difficult for Chan to demonstrate anything unconsciously, so the sensation was strange when he realized that his hand was sweating and his heart was beating a little harder. Without separating the touch, Woojin straightened his body to lie down, maintaining a sufficient distance so that the entire body of the vampire fit perfectly between his arms, with his back on the mattress and his face turned to the ceiling. At no time did he take his eyes off the curve that made his cheeks, his nose, his lips. The size of the eyelashes, the space between his eyebrows.

 

"I don't feel anything at all" Chan muttered under his breath as if telling a secret to a friend in the presence of his parents. With their hands clasped over the other's chest, Woojin could clearly hear how much his cardiovascular system disagreed with that. "But I also feel like all the weight in the world is on my shoulders now"

"I'm sorry," Woojin asked in the same tone, looking away from the way Chan's half-harsh thumb passed over the side of his wrist. "I should have heard you"

"You wouldn't" He concluded effortlessly. "I already got used to it"

 

He felt that he was misinterpreting what he really meant. Woojin had never been good with words and not so much with gestures as he thought he was. Chan was probably around for so long that losing him sounded impossible, he was comfortable with the idea that he would be back. He always came back. And even being so close, it was no longer enough to make them feel next to each other. It seemed palpable to Woojin how high the walls that separated them were now.

Woojin wishes he had cried when he had the opportunity to do it alone. The worst pain was always the one that wasn't accompanied by tears, the one that left only a huge hole where it lodged. If he were going to be really honest with himself and with Chan, he'd say he felt the same way. A mix of everything and nothing trying to occupy the same place.

 

"I was so ready to die, but I didn't want the children to go through this"

"Chan -"

"It's a little too much to digest."

 

Woojin came a little closer when he heard the voice of the other choked, the cry that wasn't coming stuck in the throat for some reason. He was sure it wasn't because it wasn't the most beautiful scene to make a vampire cry. He pressed Chan's back against his chest, his arm tight around his waist while the other hugged his shoulders. He took a deep breath when he hid his face on Chan's neck, preferring silence to that conversation again. Still, he couldn't keep it all for long.

 

“I'm sorry” _I just can't stand the thought of losing you too._

 

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Run. Hide. Fight.
> 
> My sources on youtube:  
> Just Another Day: How to Survive an Active Shooter Event on Campus  
> Surviving an Active Aggressor  
> Violent Person on Campus: Know You Can Survive


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Don't screw this up like you did with your own division by helping them get in here"

 

 

 

 **W** oojin ran a hand through his hair, the feeling that the corridor closed with each step being uncomfortably too real - although he knew it was just a silly impression. He wasn't nervous, he had already given testimonies and explained his stupidest attitudes to whoever was in charge of listening to him at that time. It was routine behavior, it was work, like any other. He slid his incredibly hot, moist palms to the back of his neck, pressing the curve between his shoulders. He could see cat hair in the messed sweater of the secretary in a long-distance, impatient as she discussed anything irrelevant to the soldier's ears. He wanted it to end soon, everything was too much at that moment.

He straightened up as each step of the boots on the burnt cement seemed higher and higher, echoing through his empty mind without having thought of making up an excuse if something was programmed to go wrong. Woojin hadn't been very aware of his attitudes and implications. He wasn't considering the fact that even if he died, whatever he planted in life will be capable of becoming a weed for those who stayed. He wasn't specifically thinking of anyone from within his area of work, he didn't care what fame he would have if they found out that he had defended - more than once - a vampire for questionable attitudes. He could list worse actions on his part over the last decade and he didn't know exactly what set him apart from someone who acted in defense.

Correcting: he had knowledge that allowed him to better swallow his privileges while they continued to last. He knew the truth, but he preferred to act above it, which wasn't showing a positive movement as he imagined. It was controversial, contradictory. Woojin knew that not everything he did was thinking of another species, his priority was never to protect vampires; it was much more about protecting the one person who was left with everything the tide had taken with it. Woojin had no friends, had no parents, had no family, had no children or anything merely similar to usual relationships. Chan having stayed when everyone was gone had a weight that only recently he seemed to give it the deserved importance.

He was being crushed by something he always felt and never gave a name to because he didn't think it was going to end. Feelings weren't an inexhaustible source, they were volatile and dishonest, they weren't resistant support to base any decision on. Woojin seemed to have thrown that whole basic concept in the trash. Someone who always tried to be more rational in his choices failed the most common idea that being too comfortable with a situation was a mistake.

He stopped for a few seconds, placing his hand on his chest, where he could feel the slight relief of the chain under the thin turtleneck that hid a mark that no longer existed on his neck. He didn't want to arouse even more suspicions about everything, taking into account that he wasn't there once again fulfilling just a protocol, however much it seemed, he wasn't that stupid. Woojin had been accumulating reasons to believe he was targeted for being in the wrong places at the right times. Or the opposite. It wasn't enough to be accused of anything, given that some of the situations weren't known to the quarters - or he hoped not - and so he concluded that his most risky act had been the injured boy for whom he didn't even have direct responsibility for.

Sometimes he wishes he was wrong in situations where he really wanted to not be so right.

 

"Oh, Commander Kim, the Major is waiting for you" Turning off her cell phone, the secretary concentrated on the newcomer, looking nervous herself to notice that the soldier wasn't that different. Each with his reasons and he admitted that his initial judgment about the woman was that it was probably just a girl. Definitely younger than him.

"Thank you" He nodded, taking the lead in turning the handle and opening the heavy door, which no sound between the hinges or the floor.

 

Woojin wasn't the biggest fan of small, closed places. The smallest window was an unreachable spot on the high, but short, wall. Inside the gray-walled room were four people, of whom only one face was familiar to him - the other soldier should come from another base, just to fulfill the safety of the couple of non-militarized humans, the only ones not to wear any kind of uniform or anything. remotely similar. In fact, they were very bright colors for a half-dead environment.

He had a bad impression. No news.

 

"Commander Kim" Jung Wook, the almost-retired and clearly unwell Major, greeted him much more warmly than he expected. Although he naturally didn't prove to be a dangerous person and in ordinary days Woojin admitted that an insect could prove to be much more intimidating. Fortunately for his superiors and the Major himself, he was fully aware that cover and content were different things. “Good that you decided to join us”

“At orders, Sir” He just swallowed the remark that it wasn't exactly his will, but that wasn't an issue to be discussed. The whole problem was always a little lower and Woojin felt he needed to walk a little further until they reached the end of the question.

“Look, Commander, these are Mr. and Ms. Choi” Woojin followed the movement to the couple, indifferent “They are the parents of the boy you saved”

 

This would be a perfect time to put everything to lose. Only a day had passed, where the subject wasn't necessarily on the rise among humans outside that specific part of the city, but that didn't mean that it wasn't a recurring subject for those who had experienced the horror of that Tuesday. No testimonies were asked from teachers and as far as Woojin knew, not even that of Secretary Kang from whom he had saved the hangman's sentence to now be placed in a moral trap. Even if it was she who noticed the first movement straight from the reception. The police didn't really care who was hurt - it was selective empathy. Vampires didn't deserve more than they already have.

The truth was that he wanted to shout out everything he had witnessed and the consequences of what had happened to the inconsequential parents of an equally execrable boy. His stomach churned with the idea that there would be shards to collect wherever he went from there, since the path home ended up crossing the neighborhood of the school, where he decided to keep his grandfather's house on the border to the almost isolated space in which vampires lived in sometimes questionable conditions. Of course, it didn't matter for the plastic smiles thanking Woojin for keeping another bad human alive.

What was the limit of his ethics after all?

 

"We were talking about your honorable attitude" _with a human_ "but I'm sure you will be able to discuss this more calmly alone" Woojin moved his eyebrow under his uncomfortably long hair at that point, aware that from Jung Wook's posture, it was clear that nothing there had been done by the boy (a murderer) as he made it look so blatantly. “But if you don't mind, I need to speak to the commander in private. Im will take you to a more comfortable place ”

 

With a simple sign from the Major, Woojin followed the couple's departure not so discreetly with the only soldier who prevented him from actually getting a good scolding from a superior. But it seemed inevitable at that point and he wasn't trying to soften anything at all for his side, he knew it would be that way. He crossed his arms in automatic reflex, watching Jung Wook's mild expression become a little less "senior citizen nerd", implementing the figure worthy of his position, either through his posture or the added tone of voice in the words that followed.

 

"It would have been tragic if the boy had died, wouldn't it, Commander?" Woojin would find it a blessing, but his honesty would be unnecessary sabotage in that context. "It's just a boy, he didn't know what he was doing -"

"I'm sure that wasn't the case, Major"

"Certainly, knowing how to use a weapon requires training, but you already had a good skill when you came in here, Commander, looking at it from that angle, maybe I should replace you" Jung Wook crossed the only table in the middle of the dimly lit room, heading towards the exit. “After all, the boy has good principles, he was doing public security work, because that place wasn't allowed to work”

"What?"

"The building you demanded that the police defend shouldn't even be open" The Major crossed his arms behind his back, his height no more than Woojin's shoulders, which helped him to be less nervous, but not as much as he would have liked “But you, Kim Woojin, commander of base 0-325, you were a hero to this family and so many others. Imagine what danger would be a collapse so close to the line that separates us, good humans, from them. ” Jung Wook rested his index finger on his chest, with a little more force than necessary. "Don't screw this up like you did with your own division by helping them get in here"

"My department is fine as it is, Sir." Carefully, he got rid of the almost piercing sensation of his finger and so close to the chain hidden under his clothes. The conversation didn't look good at that point, and it obviously wouldn't be better if Woojin expressed so explicitly which side he was on. “And all the decisions I made were based on the honor code of the quarters” which he hadn't trusted for a long time.

“I will try to be more clear, Kim. The boy was in danger in the midst of those creatures and you, as a good soldier, saved him from that, do you understand? ” The lack of response seemed sufficient to the Major. Moving further away, Jung Wook adjusted his thick-rimmed glasses, Woojin noticing the small but valid tremor in one of his hands. “I hope it doesn't happen again. You have a good track record and I believe that these small deviations can be corrected ... ”

 

At some point Woojin just focused on the sounds outside, even if muffled, letting Jung Wook say what he wanted for what was convenient; and the sooner his anti-vampire speech ended, the better it would be for both of them. Woojin even hoped that at some point he would start to really get angry, that everything he had been trying to keep under control would come out in an aggressive or physically violent way, but nothing really happened. He was tired, drained, and sad maybe be an almost allegorical word for what was going on in his head. He could hear the sound of the Jung Wook's wristwatch. Time passed and Woojin didn't know what to do with his last days. Even if he survived what was to come, he would end up dying anyway. Less or more metaphorically, it didn't matter.

 

"I won't punish you" Jung Wook caught his attention again, patient "Apparently you have been having some health problems, that seems to be enough, but notice that I am giving you a warning, Commander." Woojin definitely didn't have to worry about a next time "So, you're excused."

 

Woojin left the room with a long sigh, the secretary no longer in the extremely long and overly lit corridor, making him nauseous. He passed his hand over his face, letting his body go on the automatic back to the hall, where the idea was to go directly to his office for as long as it was necessary to stay at his place of work - despite a part of himself insisting that if he left at that very moment no one would actually care. For some reason, he recognized that it wasn't that simple. And before it was only for his moral appeal, saying that it would be worse if he went against the waves.

 

"Commander Kim" He didn't know the voice that called him and for a moment he thought it was someone else from the top to press him on the wall. Although it was a relatively soft female tone for a person of any degree of superiority. Woojin stopped, turning on his heels when he found the couple supported by the same secretary, that he didn't even know the name, so close to the entrance to the hall. Jung Wook used to change his accessors a lot. "We hoped we could talk to you"

 

Woojin let his eyes examine the couple's posture before moving on to the secretary in silence. Who had spoken to him was the boy's mother, who didn't hide her discomfort because the presence of vampires in the build was obvious, even though they weren't exactly next to her. This was an almost exclusive area, but from the hall onwards everything was a matter of perspective. Woojin could hear where Soyeon's voice was coming from with some of his co-workers, critics simply because it could be if no one heard them so well at a distance.

 

“We wanted to thank you for saving our son” Realizing the absence of movement, acceptance or rejection, the woman decided to continue. "Only God knows what could have happened if you didn't -"

"I don't know what they said to you, but It's me who shot your son" Even if it hadn't been, in fact "But it would be too much trouble for me if he died, but I hope the message is given" all the control of his last meeting, all the poison that he knew was rotting him from the inside for keeping it covered by his endless exhaustion, left for his mouth in that moment. The desire to remain without headaches being the most likely cause of all of them. He no longer wanted to be polite or tolerant. “I'm sure he understood, now it's your turn: raise your child to be a decent human or the next one I hope to get it right in the head. Have a good day.”

 

Woojin wouldn't pick up a gun again if this behavior reached the ears of the Major. Even if he distanced himself, it was hard not to hear the secretary try to soften his words without reason, the clearest he could think of in a context that irritated him more and more. It didn't matter anymore, did it? Should it be so relevant who he kept on treating well and who only demanded his education? Even because he was a government protection agent, he should serve and protect. But of course, only to a dominant and fragile class that comes from what is strange and different.

 

"You are an inconsequential imbecile" Soyeon clicked her tongue at the roof of her mouth as Woojin crossed the opposite side of the hall, finally closer to his department. "I thought it was going to be the last time I saw you around here"

“Is that what you wanted? That I would go away? ” He asked, not necessarily stopping the walk and no longer bothered that she was within reach, just behind.

"You aren't a bad commander, you have only been acting very stupid recently"

 

Soyeon closed the office door as soon as he passed her, Woojin immediately going to his desk where the entire report of what had happened at school was huddled in a small pile on the right. He had revisited the attack more times than he thought it was necessary, looking for flaws n the same testimony that he had given to the police officer still at the scene or outside, on paper and verbally. In all of them, at least, the idea prevailed that the shot had been fired by his hands and not by third parties. He would keep that to anyone who wanted to know his part of the story, deciding that he would have no problem keeping a secret between himself and Mrs. Kang - he was not counting the shooter as a worrying factor for now.

He kept his eyes on Soyeon's, whose colors came in a slight violet since she didn't have the same problem as Chan - vampires had a horrible sight, but few were in fact 100% blind. Still, he knew that she probably saw him much more as a blur than an image with defined shape and contours. He wouldn't really be grateful for the half-critical praise received from a person who he didn't trust but didn't suspect either. Soyeon was a neutral zone, someone who never really mattered until that second. Especially when she spoke again, taking his silence as an incentive - something that seemed to happen often, by the way.

 

"Thank you for what you did" Woojin raised his eyebrows, puzzled and confused. Soyeon crossed her arms and leaned her back against the door, much more defensive than he was used to seeing her even in the most heated discussions.

"I know you don't really care about my species, but at least you're not trying to kill us"

"I have no reason for that" He pursed his lips, discreetly moving his interlaced fingers on the table. "To care or not"

"But you do it anyway, and I know you have a reason"

 

Woojin never really hid anything from anyone, if he were to think for that aspect. The vampire community was much smaller than he realized - mainly because it wasn't equally socially favored speaking - making him believe that for those older people in the context of internal movements, Chan was no secret. His record was still registered there as one of the reasons why his species was considered a problem; although he wasn't the only one to have been involved in problems with public security because he required a little more space. But they were teenagers, Woojin had also made the same kind of mistake. They were together during the first vampire rights movement, Woojin just never really took the cause as his own as Chan still did.

And he still won't. It never would be his thing. He wasn't able to feel what Chan felt on his skin because in the most present moment Woojin faced something much worse. Close, but still distant.

 

"You may be an asshole, but at least you care about him"

"Can we not talk about this now?" He asked, finding his voice deep in his throat to say he didn't want to relive the thoughts of the previous day or those of just a few hours ago. It was much more to him than really a reprimand to Soyeon.He knew that in her view Chan was just a good friend, perhaps his best friend since Woojin had no other to lean on. But it was more than that, far more than he was comfortable with letting anyone but himself know. "I just did my job, Soyeon, I followed ethics as the oath I made when I entered here, I don't care if there are people who forget this type of thing the moment they pass through the gate"

 

Her smile didn't tell him much, and in part, he came to the conclusion that he didn't want to know what it really meant. Maybe she knew without having to say it.

 

"My sister was at that school, I thought you would like to know, you are her new hero"

 

Woojin remained staring at the wooden door when Soyeon left, the feeling of the word _hero_ even heavier than in other connotations when redirected to him. He was tired of rambling about the fact that he was none of that, that there was no real need to be put on a pedestal for putting his life in the background. Although he had a faithful belief that he would hardly be the target of the shooter in that context, even if he had been seen by him before. Besides, it was out of hand the number of times he repeated the same inconsequence, going against all sides and still managing to be strangely admired by both.

He wasn't a saint, he wasn't an angel. He was rotten inside and everything he touched became martyr along with him. He didn't want to be the figure to save a human from the fearsome vampires, any more than he wanted to be the holy grail of vampires for having “saved” them from a human. The damn imbecile teenager with no opinion of his own, guided by the most outdated beliefs and an apparently predominant ignorance, fueled by an invisible veil that separated “us” from “them”.

He looked at the clock with a long sigh. At least everything was close to an end now.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

He rested his fingertips against one temple, supporting the weight of his head no matter how much he just wanted to drop it against the table at that point. The silence consumed him little by little, becoming a problem now that any small noise was able to raise the hair on his body like a scared cat, the cold of the walls of the house itself being untenable for Chan, even though living alone was the reality of almost a lifetime.

And he was used to the trauma that that kind of thing brought. Not the "style" he had chosen to move his existence and what was potentially threatening to it. Much of the decisions made hadn't been by his own hands or influences by his wishes. Chan never thought of being a teacher, but he also never thought of quitting the profession even when what he taught was considered cultured - but he never touched on the fact that he had a religion in the classroom, since that wasn't even something that it was convenient for him to show their students when they started from different creations. He himself had a strange way of perceiving the world as he grew up, without a "guide" to what he might become.

Now he was looking very metaphorically at the closed door or in the direction which had hit the last person who had passed through it. He no longer had a job, but that wasn't as worrying news as it should be. Or he was probably just dealing with the situation as if it was a phantom member, something that didn't exist but he could still feel in his routine. It was like everything was going to return to normal at some point, but the truth is that there wasn't even a prediction for things to improve. Life had its ups and downs, but at that moment the line on the chart no longer had spaces of decline to cross.

And Chan just wanted a break to enjoy worldly things that would never be the same from then on.

He got up, walking barefoot on the excessively cold floor, going towards the small, polished wooden radio over the little-used fireplace, tuning it to any station. Somehow it made him nostalgic, but not in the way that possibly the whole house should mean to whom see it. Sitting on the couch with nowhere to go and what to do, Chan just let himself be heard, an excessively qualitative skill against all the rest of his almost inanimate system.

Not that CDs and DVDs no longer existed according to the oldest memory he had. Perhaps it was something difficult to access in the past, but they were always around, circulating. Chan had no way of making much distinction from one to the other, in which case the sound reached his ears in a good melody. Music was responsible for maintaining a good part of his relationships, even though all of them at some point became one more stain. He had fond memories of some specific chords, of long piano pieces and backyard romance.

It was very likely that none of this was something that one day he would share with anyone - Chan didn't talk much about his own tastes, wants and his past as a whole. He didn't use to talk much about his present either. It wasn't uncommon for him to say how he felt, but it was different to make it clear what he wanted from a relationship with someone, for himself, for the world around him. He didn't express much more than he was allowed to do. Or what was policed to demonstrate in that character he created as a kind of balance and self-defense. The truth was, it didn't work as well as it seemed at first. Maybe he should have screamed louder or do it more often. Get out of that claustrophobic space and take action.

He ran a hand through his hair, then held his face over his closed fists, his elbows each on one knee. It wasn't the principal's fault that the school needed to close. It wasn't the fault of the teachers or any employee. It wasn't the students' fault. He honestly couldn't even blame the police, who despite the obstacles of their ignorance was still there. Chan wasn't blaming his nature or the nature of his species either, it wasn't like it was optional to be a vampire, it was impossible to turn someone into one. So for who he should deliver that guilt bag because everything was destroyed in the blink of an eye, something he saw struggling to be possible, but in the end, it was worth so little? He couldn't carry that extra weight for the rest of his life, not when he had so many others doing different measurements on his shoulders.

 

"Apparently the news came before me"

 

He hadn't heard Woojin's arrival, but it didn't matter who really invaded his space now that he didn't have so much more to lose. If Chan was not given as part of humanity, he had no space as a social individual and had nothing else to hold on to, everything seemed a little unnecessary to protect behind his walls. He was feeling empty because he had nothing left to believe. It was a matter of time before Woojin also became one of the things that escaped his fingers, even in the best of scenarios. They always approached each other before moving away again.

 

"It came shortly after you left" It was as if he hadn't used his voice in a few days, even if it was a partial truth. Chan listened much more, without really absorbing it, than was imposed on the problems that came on horseback. "I even got that license together with Irene, I had forgotten how easy it was to destroy a piece of paper."

" _Several_ pieces of paper" He heard Woojin cross the space from the entrance to the sofa, keeping a safe distance as usual for whatever the real threat was. Chan wouldn't break any more than he already felt broken if he got any closer.

 

He moved his head as the other left something next to his foot, probably a purse or something alike, not thinking it necessary to ask since soon Woojin would speak. He could feel the leather band touching his toes, a little sunk in the carpet. Now that his mind was silent, he could also hear his company's racing heart, the borrowed chain freed from the collar of his shirt beating against his chest with each movement. And Woojin, when nervous, unconsciously moved too much.

 

"Come on, Woojin, there's nothing you can tell me that makes things worse now"

 

Despite the incentive, he knew it wasn't that way. Of course, the practice was something that would know not to fulfill his expectations, the reality was independent of what he thought. Whatever happened or was going to happen in those minutes would only prove the point that everything else would be a consequence. A wrong step that now became a race to the edge of the abyss.

 

"We need to talk. About us. ”

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know if there are any mistakes, sorry if it has, I run out of time recently, but soon I correct what I have to correct. 
> 
> Take care of yourselves, comments and constructive criticism are welcome, theories too. Thanks for reading ~


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "What made you want to talk about something that for years you pretended that didn't exist?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really thinking about giving up on this story. Even though I gave it a lot of me, the lack of feedback and the recent events over the shipp discouraged me enough to continue writing. And it's not just about changing the characters or anything. I still haven't thought what to do about it.   
> And it's not just that fanfic. I had many more planned and some already made that I intended to post. And now I don't feel willing to do it. I don't blame the quarantine either because I've been used to staying at home for years. I'm just depressed. Very depressed.  
> This isn't a definitive answer on whether or not to delete. It's just me venting. In fact, I didn't check the mistakes and translate them without really paying attention. I'll come back to see this later. Sorry.

 

 

 

" **W** hen you go?"

 

For the time since the short silence had been built, it wasn't exactly the question that Woojin expected to hear out of all possible questions. Even more if, looking now, Chan already seemed to foresee some things already discussed before. He hoped him would go away and more and more Woojin realized that it might not be temporary - and not because of a large percentage of life-threatening - but because for the first time he wouldn't be taking the vampire with him. Although the whole depth of the situation was only superficially understood.

They were facing each other, their hands empty on both sides and as much as they had to say, they would probably be in the shallowest. In what could be just seen so that it might hurt less. Chan recognized that it wasn't the best tactic, but he wasn't trying to win on a chessboard. The blow went faster if it came honestly and quickly. At some point, he shrank his legs over the sofa and crossed his arms, again with that ridiculous habit of making himself smaller than necessary, forcing everything to be much bigger and scary than it should have. And depending on the response he received it was obvious that the impact could and would be proportionately greater.

Woojin just looked up, forgetting for a moment that there was no real reason for Chan to keep a calendar stuck on the walls of the house.

 

“Still this week” He preferred not to be precise, it wasn't really what mattered. He straightened up, placing his forearm on the top of the sofa, his hands still far from any part of Chan that made it possible for the moment to be comfortable and not just strange. There was something keeping the distance no longer so hypothetical.

 

Chan brought his right hand to his chest, not as discreetly as he expected, seeking the only comfort he could get without expressing the intensity of his feelings too much. That was where the only sensation of light came from when everything around him was dark, but he forgot that he didn't carry his pendant with him and when he found that empty space in the palm of his hand, he took a deep breath, closing his eyes.

 

"I think you're looking for this" Woojin took the liberty of approaching, holding Chan's wrist until his fingers touched the space between his collarbone, now evidently above the turtleneck he wore. The metal was warm, its texture contrasted with the wool knots that surrounded part of his fingerprints. Chan sighed with relief. Of course, he had left an extremely important part of himself with him, metaphorically and physically.

 

While the vampire kept his hand in the same place for as long as he thought necessary, Woojin took the initiative of opening the clasp pressed against the back of his neck, carefully getting rid of the necklace that remained malleable between Chan's fingers until he stepped back, taking it with him. Woojin hoped that, if there were any God at all, _He_ would understand him. That _He_ realized how much his importance was now worth to those who stayed - and it didn't necessarily refer only to the fine line between life and death in that context. Although Woojin didn't believe in that possibility, it was what was left to support himself as everyone did at the last second, when they feared that everything they had ever known was likely to end.

But his concern wasn't really linked to what he felt about himself. The more tired he was, the less the idea of ceasing to exist seemed terrifying. He also didn't believe that everything had its moment to happen, but it sounded certain that it would be there, when there was still something to be done to cover the feeling of emptiness that an end left in a story. His life hadn't been worth it at all. He hadn't done his best, he hadn't received the best from others either. At least, in large part. They were reactions consistent with their own and Woojin couldn't blame anyone for what he planted and reaped.

 

"I wanted to be able to believe in some God" He broke the silence again, but without taking his eyes off the way Chan held the symbol of his religion, a little frosted by the lack of effective light to reflect the delicacy of its outline. "Maybe it had changed something"

"Gods don't change mundane things in our lives, Woojin" The soldier raised his attention to the other's face, whose furrowed brows and pursed lips gave the impression of concentration. “Idols are reference, not miraculous salvation” Chan relaxed his shoulders “I wanted to have the strength he had to go through things that I can't even imagine feeling on my skin. My problems seem too small and easy to solve when I remember that I am nothing too big and that there is so much more that I don't know. I wanted this to be just one more of them.”

“With each passing day, it'll hurt less” He tried to comfort, but he no longer understood who was directly affected by it “The problem is to endure the pain every day”

“Something's been missing for a long time”

 

Chan traced the pendant with his thumb, moving the necklace in his hands for a little longer until he put it back where it hadn't left for years until that specific moment. And he didn't know exactly why he hoped leaving with Woojin part of his belief would help, just as it was uncertain to say that it had worked just because that was one of the very few cases where they weren't stressed by each other's presence; since life was about everything as a big joke and nothing was really under their control. He didn't know what to think. The fact that Woojin no longer wanted to get away from a subject that didn't necessarily please them both made him much more uncomfortable than if they remained watching everything from a catastrophic angle. Maybe he was just used to pretending that nothing was crumbling around him.

 

"Thank you" His voice was too low for a common circumstance, but there, where only the two occupied a space of noise, everything ended up coming louder than they would like.

"For what?"

"I don't know exactly" Chan abandoned the chain against his chest, bringing his knees closer, where he only supported his forearms. Woojin hadn't moved and he felt his eyes fixed on him all the time. "You weren't as good to me as I like to think"

"We are getting somewhere"

"You speak as if it was positive"

"And it is. I needed to hear that. ” Woojin moved his hips to slide the spine into a comfortable position, but definitely contraindicated. Chan heard him take a deep breath, almost anguished to draw air into his lungs. His hands were crossed just below his chest. "I don't really feel heroic for any decision I made"

"It's not your fault"

"Of course it is. It just wouldn't be if wasn't me who made all of this ” Chan's shoulders were tense, but not for conventional reasons. He felt stupid for always trying to defend what he had no defense for. "This is the only situation where I didn't cause this to myself, and yet …"

"If you believed in God, perhaps you could consider it a divine punishment"

"He wouldn't care so much about me at that point" Chan heard him moisten his lips, unconsciously concentrating on that attitude. "But you care"

"What a stupid I am, right?"

"I'm sorry and I know I've been saying this a lot more than I'm really feeling it"

"What made you want to talk about something that for years you pretended that didn't exist?"

 

Because he could die wasn't a good answer and any other Woojin knew it wouldn't come. He was feeling stupid enough to be letting it all out, reaching his ears with unmatched indifference and falsehood. Of course, his feelings didn't matter. He couldn't have anything positive, he wasn't an optimistic person in any way, there wasn't a minute when he looked at the positive side of stopping being what he was. Probably much more in theory, in practice, Woojin never has the chance to be something.

 

“This isn't the best time, Woojin. I thought it was." Chan wrinkled his nose and eyebrows, his expression not quite in line with his words, but at the same time consistent with the reaction he expected. "But it still hurts -"

"wha-"

"Absolutely everything. Having lost my job, my identity, maybe my home soon and now you; ” His breath was shaky and his eyes stung. “I can't blame you. I want to, but I can't. You helped me when no one else would do it I just ... I thought you would always be with me. And this is probably the moment in my life when it hurts the most. It hurts so much that I can't even cry. I expected this and I just wanted to be wrong.”

 

Woojin didn't respond, as usual. Chan no longer really wanted to hear an answer. The sensation was that he was being watched while he burned, he set fire to his own feet and every word ran down his mouth like an even more flammable fuel. He knew it wasn't the end and it didn't comfort him to hear his conscience say that life went on. Whatever was consuming him and which, as the soldier himself had pointed out, would continue to hurt day after day and even if it passed, his tracks wouldn't disappear that easily.

 

"What did I do?" Again his face contorted as if the pain wasn't just emotional. His hands were rigid near his knees, his fingers spread nervously. “I know it wouldn't have been better if I had gone the other way when you showed up, maybe I wasn't even alive now, but what's the use of waking up and breathing every day if all this shit is still hurting and I can't do anything at all to stop! Why didn't you leave me to die like everyone else has always done with my species? And why right now do you decide to let me waiting for you to leave with an appointment? Nothing will change in the next few days, there is nothing that can be done that will fix all of this. It's no use coming here wanting to talk about us if there was never even a us, Woojin. It was always just you. ”

 

The vampire stood up, his bare feet uncertain as he touched the ground inappropriately supporting all the weight of his body. It looked much denser but simultaneously light. It was difficult to recognize the environment where he was and probably due to the speed of the gesture guided by pure impulse. Chan felt dizzy, for a few seconds placing his hands between his hair seeking the stability that it was so easy to lose when everything was already lost.

 

“I know that you are a good person, but I can’t even believe in me anymore. With each passing day you show how all these years I was just a dead weight to you. I'm sorry for what your parents did, I'm sorry for your grandfather, I'm sorry for the friends you could have had if it weren't for me. I should have known before.” Chan felt his hands tremble, had the impression that everything around him seemed colder and the absence of anything big in response to the feeling of overload didn't make anything much better. He slid his fingertips under his eyes, feeling moist and slimy. "Oh shit" He took a few steps back, lowering his head as he tried not to contradict himself. It hurt, of course, but I shouldn't be able to feel anything else. At some point, he should have gotten used to it

"It looks like you already have a very firm view of me without having to ask"

"And what would you answer me for if I had asked?" Chan restrained his own strength by staying in place even when Woojin had stood up, arms crossed and a distance that no longer made him so safe. He felt exposed, which shouldn't be so uncomfortable with someone he thought he trusted. “Stop lying to me, please. I know you aren't sorry, I know you do absolutely nothing because you don't worry about whether I will be alive tomorrow or not. ”

"Chan, stop listening to your paranoia and listen to me just once. Only once." Woojin took a step forward, bringing both hands on his face, too hot for those who seemed not to have been warm in centuries. The vampire squinted, swallowing the sob in his throat, his fingers immediately hooked on the other's extremely fast pulse. In return, Woojin felt as if his heart could actually explode. Nothing came out as he wanted it to. He really had nothing to say and it was terrifying to realize that even if he did, nothing would solve it. "I have nowhere else to go." He admitted, quietly, as much as the beginning of that conversation that had escalated to what he least expected would happen. "You are my home."

"Stop it"

“I can't always live in the same place” And not because he didn't want to, after all, he was really there, under a roof of more than years, with walls that lasted no less than a dozen more storms. "I don't know what you expect me to say or do about it."

"I just want you to stop, whatever you're trying to do." Chan moved the other's palms away from him, even though he didn't immediately let go. “Stop breaking my heart, I'm not a damn doll. I'm sick of you, I gave you everything, Woojin. I don't want to live like this anymore. ” Finally he withdrew his arms, leaving them lifeless beside his own body. “I don't hate you and that sucks. Think about what you want, it’s not you who spent your whole life trying to find a gap to fit in. ”

 

Chan ran his hand over his face again, dragging his wrist heavily over his eyes. He missed the warmth on his face. He hadn't stopped crying just because he wanted to. It still burned. Every tear that left the curve of his jaw towards the carpet came like the ringing of bells in his ears. It might look bad, but for now, it silenced everything that seemed too much in his head in the last few minutes.

 

"Go away. Please." He asked, exhausted. “You can come back tomorrow, I don't care. Just go away. Now."

 

Woojin stared at the floor, his feet covered with shiny boots while Chan's remained bare, his tense fingers curled inward, again trying to become much less than the problem - which was no longer a problem when there was no solution. It was just a fact, an event, not even a prediction if it was difficult to change it without luck. The idea wasn't to reduce the chances to less than half. In fact, the idea wasn't even to agree with anything Chan had said and he didn't, but it didn't seem worth it to argue. Soyeon was so wrong that he could make it a bad joke every time he closed his eyes from then on and could hear, in the depths of his anguish, her saying that Chan was lucky to have him. Woojin never gave any reason for him to think the same way.

And as much as all that time he could consider Chan's semi-monologue away from the conversation he really wanted to have, Woojin didn't insist on trying to apologize out of the mouth that time. At least, how it would sound if he tried. He wasn't being true enough, he never was. So he didn't answer, just taking the distance towards the exit, his arms tightly crossed against his chest just undone to unlock the lock.

Chan simultaneously sobbed at the slam of the door, but it wouldn't matter when he could still hear him from wherever he was.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

At fifteen, Woojin had won his first gun. It was a common gift at that age, something like an "initiation" for what started at the time of his parents, more precisely. Or problems that became more visible just when they gained more strength. It wasn't that long ago to be a forgettable moment, but Woojin had no tendency to relive certain intervals between events that formed his personality - much of it unwillingly. It didn't work anymore, anyway. Whether physically or emotionally, it didn't really arouse any feeling now that shooting to kill became so common.

But maybe if he tried it would still hurt, with a little force on the rusty trigger nothing was impossible at close range. Rifles weren't very practical weapons for him, but they gave a wallowish air in the wall of the living room. Along with the rarely used fireplace, the furniture of fifty years ago and the stuffed animal heads through the corridors, it wasn't difficult to fit in, to belong to that chaotic season where it all came down to life or death. Your grandfather was a tragicomic person in that respect. He taught him in completely unruly ways of a common moral sense that nothing was worth much. Woojin adored him but admitted that he was pretty stupid. Perhaps it was age.

It was strange that the person most present in his life didn't have a single portrait in any of the rooms. Woojin had thrown them all into a box on top of the hardwood wardrobe, in the middle of his grandfather's death when he had to empty the house due to termite attacks on so much edible old stuff. Janghoon was a man with fixed beliefs who would be disappointed to discover everything he had done in recent years and even under his nose, under his roof. And Woojin wasn't proud, but neither was he afraid of his grandfather's judgment. He didn't believe that dead people could return to life or that they had so much power over someone. In his case, maybe he was halfway there. He felt as if the last part of him had been gone in the past two hours and would probably find him "over there".

Woojin rested a hand on the mattress, his eyes fixed on his feet on the cold wooden floor - he had removed the carpet, which wasn't exactly the best idea when winter could still be too harsh in that area, but he never thought in putting it back. And now he wouldn't do it either. He also never thought to fix the wiring and deal with infiltrations. Remove the mold from the corner of some of the walls, replace the creaking boards and the rusty hinge doors and broken locks. Everything there was falling apart, but he hardly had so much time to devote himself to looking at details. He could say he only did that because it was his way of not thinking about Chan and how to say he was sorry wasn't valid. He hoped it wasn't after so many times repeated in the wind.

In the hand opposite to the one that held his inclined upper body, Woojin turned over the black card that gave him access to his own money, automatically accumulated in his account for the services provided to the quarters and that he was hardly able to find a reason to withdraw. That day, however, he had made a large withdrawal, although not suspect. He had also cleaned out drawers, shoe boxes, cupboard bottoms. All the money scattered around the house, including selling the car itself in pieces earlier this month, was all in that damn bag. Woojin wouldn't use it. Dead people had no capitalist debts, only moral ones.

Of course, Chan hadn't expected him to say what he had in mind. Now he didn't even have a reason to keep the rush, and he hoped the vampire would at least remain in possession of the bag, regardless of whether it was in the same place he had left it in the living room, just under the sofa. He would find another way, eventually. After hearing him talk about all his flaws and the image that he passed - which was also not surprising for someone who never really had comfort in himself, making it too illusory to expect him to give a different view to the world around him - Woojin it would seem pitful if he tried to help. Or keep what he was already doing, consciously or not.

He foresaw what could be coming in the worst-case scenario. Chan wasn't incapable, but he was able more than ever to see how neglectful he had been in his conduct to protect him all this time without really seeming to realize that that wasn't what he asked for. Once was enough. And as much as that could easily be added to all the others in which Woojin would lead to being understood as a desire for the position of a hero and not for genuine feeling, whatever he was, he wouldn't go back with the plan he had. It was part of all that stupid bureaucracy and no matter how hard they tried, it was still too small to change a feeling redirected to a particular species before they even knew it was real. Especially in aspects that weren't expected.

He got up, tossing the card on the bed before leaving the room. If he was going to have to go through that, especially with the view that nothing could really help him to reverse the situation at that point, he should prepare. Woojin knew that there was no possibility to leave where he was towards the forest, to cross the city in record time so that he wouldn't hurt anyone with all his limbs loose. Not even if he still owned the car or anything that moved on wheels faster than he would on his own legs without drawing attention. It was inappropriate and went against the quarters' recommendations - which were always much more for a suggestion since wolves weren't captured but killed, without the need for a guide to keeping them in place.

Woojin knew he was underestimating his own strength after what little he had tasted of it and what he might come to know if he went through it alive - or even if he had the strength to break his bones on his own by the time the full moon reached the top. As he walked down the hall towards the door that opened openly to the garage, he thought it was a naturally flawed plan, but the only one he had if things had to happen that way. He could be more cautious and abandon everything beforehand, but he didn't like the idea of being left to die regardless of how familiar the death was.

It was strange to think that he didn't want to be completely alone, even if it could cost much more than he could measure in just data and numbers. The walls of the house no longer had the comfort of before, his grandfather had passed away so long ago that he was no longer reminded of Janghoon's hoarse laugh and his advice never applicable to situations like these. Mainly because Woojin didn't intend to get married, or anything like that. Janghoon really should have imagined that he wouldn't end up in the middle of the crossfire, serving purposes that weren't really his - and all because, like most of his fellow professionals, Woojin just needed money when he started. Still, being there comforted him much more than knowing that if he died and his body would be left as far away from everyone around him as possible. He wanted to feel the presence in the neighboring houses as if they were in his own and not the sound of animals too small to understand the immensity that situation had in his head.

He moved through the pile of trinkets from the last century, from a family tree that Woojin didn't know. He knew he had an uncle, but Janghoon had never liked his son very much - although his father wasn't his grandfather's favorite person either, and he might have begun to think that the problem was a little more piled up in years of poor communication inside and outside of the house. And although it looks like a pattern, a trend from his surname, Woojin wouldn't blame anyone else for what he himself never worked to improve. He was just reaping the consequences.

Woojin removed one of the boxes in the corner, wiping his hands of dust on the edges of the uniform shortly thereafter. He hadn't thought to remove it, didn't seem of the utmost importance at the time. With the help of the house keys, he opened the tape that kept the box closed, throwing out irrelevant things at the top until he started pulling a large and heavy chain. It was what locked the doors in storms. Even without all confidence, it might work. If he was as lucky as he hadn't been until then. But as he pulled the iron against the cardboard, letting it pile up on a set of rusted metal rings, he didn't expect a cracked frame to fall at his feet from the bottom of the box. He dropped what he was doing, crouching down in front of the wooden frame corroded by termites, although the photo remained intact, only yellowed.

One child in the center, two men on each side. A tall, strong but elderly gentleman, while the other was just a little smaller, with his strange mustache too thick for his small eyes and the cheekbones so marked, evident. The child, well, Woojin knew himself from afar, even though he could no longer fit into anything his six-year-old self would expect. His mother wasn't in the picture. None of those people had stayed.

Now he remembered. That was why he had taken away the photo from his office.

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "It's a friend's advice"
> 
> "Do you want one too?"

 

 

 

 **W** oojin looked up from the card to the hand that held it close to the table, while right next to him the plastic bag was deposited with a muffled sound. He even could see by its transparency the box with the logo hidden by an irrelevant code sticker. He hoped it would be something lasting, he had an old-fashioned conception that children didn't have as much attachment for the material as adults - mainly because in that case he had paid for the object in question, so he hoped that Jeongin would give his soul for the new cellphone he intended to give him; since he himself ignored the rule when he abused the boy's old device so much on the run inside that school.

 

"You shouldn't leave your password with anyone" Jisung pulled out the chair in front of him, watching Woojin put the card in his pocket before returning to what he was doing without paying so much attention. "I almost bought one for myself"

"If you did, I wouldn't mind, but it's good that you didn't." Although bills of that type weren't a problem, Woojin had plans for all the money accumulated over the time he served the quarters, regardless of the semi-certainty he had that it would be impossible to clean everything up by the weekend. "It says a lot more about you than it does about me"

"I thought you didn't like phones and such -"

"I never said that"

“But you don't have one. If so, I never saw you with it. ”Jisung propped his elbow on the arm of the chair, his hand below his chin as he faced Woojin's agility as he wrote in almost unreadable handwriting. Hurry was really an enemy of perfection.

“There is no one to call me or anyone to call. Why exactly would I have one? ” The soldier dropped the pen, tapping the pad of his fingers on the paper. "It's not for me"

"Clearly, after this conversation"

"Do you want to tell me about the benefits of your choice?"

 

Woojin changed the subject before Jisung and his naturally curious essence went into the fact of what, because, and why. He had to avoid a lot of questions about the origin of the call and the phone, which luckily there wasn't much left for him to not justify his words - or lies. He had been hiding a lot in the past few days, unconcerned with the consequences until he had to actually stop to think about them. He rested his hand below his face, mirroring the other, allowing himself to spend time thinking while Jisung stuffed his cheeks to talk seriously about the benefits of the chosen cellphone. Since Woojin wouldn't understand it even if he devoted his entire focus to explanation, he didn't even bother.

He focused on the truth of what was his priority for now. Woojin knew he was in a delicate situation, where living and dying wasn't in his hands - it never really was, if he stopped to think with some care - and so he was always preparing for both. One more than the other, unconsciously feeding what was most pessimistic about itself. That morning, Woojin hadn't made much of a point of making his bed, washing the dishes, even if not really accumulated, nor did he lock his door when he left without having much to prevent anyone from taking in his absence. The bag he had taken to work carried an extra weight and now he could say that he wasn't comfortable in coming back knowing that he would have to try to fix what he did again.

Chan was right, his ego wasn't enough to continue to deny that Woojin always acted on his own interests beyond benefits to others. He wasn't even trying to sound really sympathetic and being aware of it made Soyeon's words another one of those burdens he didn't want to be carrying. Woojin knew that there were also those who saw his dichotomy as a pure drama because, after all, being categorized as a hero was why many people chose to do what they did, everyone was inclined to try to be "good" as food for what they had of the most selfish. There was no really charity, it was just an exchange, conscious or not, of moral prestige.

It was strange to be aware that everywhere he looked, something seemed out of place. Sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively. He was seeing the world in one way, all very black and white. Woojin felt he should be in a hurry, but he wasn't. At this point, his eyes were focused on Jisung, but he didn't really see him, not even the endless pile of response about his actions really seemed to matter. He knew that to say he was exhausted was to hit the same key over and over again, but he hoped that all that added to the last month - no less chaotic than all the others in recent years, possibly with just more differentiated, debatable and invincible problems - would cause him the expected irritability reaction that no longer came. Not often or persistently. Definitely not what he was expecting.

 

"I'm sure Jeongin will learn to deal with this" He concluded, not exactly interrupting since all the important part of Jisung's speech already seemed to have really passed. He also promptly ignored the raised eyebrow at the name that he clearly didn't know, even though Woojin tried to immediately invent an answer that would only silence any possible question. "Birthday"

"Oh, wow, he's a lucky boy"

"It's just a phone" And eventually it would be replaced or that Woojin wasn't really sure he could really give it to the boy without his parents knowing and adding everything that happened, putting two and two together. He didn't even imagine the excuse Jeongin had used to be better than just saying he lose an almost archaic object. "Whether he will use it to write a biography of the president or 'troll' on the internet doesn't matter to me" Despite finding the first option difficult, for anyone.

"There are some good things on the internet, old man, you should try"

 

Woojin pursed his lips while Jisung kept a smile on his face, worthy of anyone who had won an argument - even though there was obviously none and it didn't make much sense to continue debating that kind of thing. On the other hand, when Woojin got better on the back of his chair, he realized that it was easy to dispel some headaches when Jisung still took everything as if it were going to end well. And in some cases, it was actually expected to happen that way but he had been chewed enough to believe that it was unlikely to improve. In multiple ways.

Woojin didn't think he was really a good person at some point, but better than he was for his relatively close thirty years, much more theoretical now that he had no plans to cross the journey for the weekend. He had never been exactly innocent, but he still had a less drastic view of the world at twelve. Things were strange, they always were, but it had been too common a scenario around him to have taken so long to admit that he had never really crossed the path that would leave less scratches. It was unconscious to sabotage himself that way. Too simple thinking was just utopian.

 

"What are you going to do when you finish, Jisung?"

"Finish what?"

"Expedient" Or the speech, Jisung was easy to measure on any new subject if he was kept silent for a few seconds longer than what Woojin allowed. In addition, it was an optimistic scenario for what he himself intended, after all he wasn't exactly sure if it would be necessary to go overtime as he ended up doing with some frequency. Especially given the latest circumstances. "I didn't want to go home so early today"

 

Woojin wasn't in the habit of being honest about that type of thing. Living alone was never really a problem, it had just become one. His demons weren't being cooperative, but he would ignore as much as possible. There was so little time left that trying to solve anything that had to be solved in a bureaucratic manner was just a way to occupy his head, much more than arriving at strategic or simply viable solutions. But it was stopping to work, however, little by little.

 

"I never thought that day would come" Jisung placed both hands on his chest, rotating the chair simultaneously with Woojin's gesture of sighing, in a dense breath.

“Jisung, you aren't a schoolgirl, this isn't a date” He recalled, despite acknowledging that it was only drama. "Besides, I haven't said anything yet"

"Still"

"I changed my mind"

"You can't do that, it filled me with expectations now." Jisung withdrew the pen from Woojin's front, using it to gesture exaggeratedly when he pretended indignation. “Well, if you don't, I will. So, wanna go to a bar later? ”

 

Woojin smiled.

 

"No."

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

"Hey, think fast"

 

Woojin didn't imagine that he had such a good reflex until it had to be tested, with Jisung just throwing one of the crate's cans towards him with a warning that he didn't necessarily manage to digest the contents until the can was already in his hand, smashed. He was less aware of his strength when he wasn't really paying attention to its use, it was visible.

 

"Dude, you're really working out, huh" Woojin tossed the can into the nearest trash, using his own shirt to dry his soaked hand - which now smelled like pure alcohol, which led him to believe that Jisung had saved enough to buy the cheapest brand known by the menkind. Great, one more thing to leave a bad taste in his mouth. Meanwhile, the other just left the rest of the cans in the space between them on the bench, nearly by their feet. "How did you do that?"

"Stop wasting it!" Jisung took the drink fresh from the plastic rings just so that he could test the same strength that Woojin knew was far from human, just by the way the aluminum had warped between his fingers in an instant before. “Money doesn't grow on a tree”

"This is too contradictory for those who said it would be okay if I bought a phone for myself on your account"

"And there isn't, but you paid for the drink, not me"

 

Woojin moved the seal on the can until it opened and the aluminum ring came off, occupying the palm of his hand so that it looked much smaller than it was. Half of his nails were still hidden by band-aids, this time in a different order; the rest he had the job of painting with the darkest enamel shade that he managed to find among Chan's things the first time, preferring to camouflage with strange aesthetics problems that he couldn't fix. And it seemed uncharacteristic there, almost fitted in an unnecessarily forced way.

 

"I should have said before, but I ended up forgetting" Jisung wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, drawing the older's attention for only a few seconds "You paint your nails really badly"

 

Woojin just laughed, not really having the strength to argue. He had never done that in his life, but they were much worse days before, compared to that specific moment.

 

"It's not one of the things I'm good at, definitely"

"You should have asked your friend to do that then -"

"You know that Chan is blind, don't you?" At some point, he didn't even make sense to keep hidden what Jisung already knew, even though he never really got into the credit of the kind of relationship he had with the vampire. Nowadays Woojin didn't even know very well and labels weren't his specialty, although he seems to use the stereotype of them all as a way of criticizing others.

"And how does he paint his nails then?"

"I have no idea" Woojin took a short sip of the drink whose hands warmed up too quickly for his taste. The alcohol went down hotter than expected under those circumstances. "Have you considered the fact that he paid someone else to do this?"

"Oh" Jisung pursed his lips, not taking his eyes off the random fixed point on the other side of the sidewalk where they were standing. The night was beginning to fall and soon the sign would be given for them to return home; which Woojin normally didn't obey, but as a soldier, it was irrelevant that he followed it to the letter. “Yuri always paints her nails by herself, I had forgotten that it's something you can pay for someone else to do”

"Is Yuri your girlfriend?"

"Yeah" Jisung's smile was full of that usual boyishness with a hint of something that Woojin didn't know how to punctuate what it was. Maybe pride, maybe just silly happiness at having come up with a subject that was so common in social circles, but that Woojin had hitherto pretended didn't exist. "You already met her, didn't you?"

"Did I?"

"I think so. She's Major Jung's secretary, she started this month"

"I'm sure my first impression was bad then" Woojin wasn't in his best mood on the day in question and no matter how much he tried to apologize, he wouldn't be sincere, he felt no remorse. He knew that she had tried to control the damage of his words to the Choi couple and that might even make him feel a little guilty about what happened, but Woojin just stared at his hands, feeling empty of anything merely similar.

"She thought it was funny" Jisung smiled, understandable "People are idiots, Woojin, mostly humans"

"If we stay here for another hour, get ready to see the worst of the vampires too"

"They have their reasons, don't they?"

 

They had. Woojin knew very well that things were difficult at completely unbalanced levels, where justice worked for specific groups - from humans, vampires, any humanoid creature with a type of social organization similar to theirs, “rational” beings. In particular, he thought everyone was too stupid to put themselves in a position of superiority when Woojin felt so many times that animals were more sensible than their owners.

 

"When they started that march a few years ago, I wanted to get in the middle, but I was always too much of a coward for anything."

"You were a child, Jisung"

"There's that too" Jisung stretched out, crossing his heels and finishing the first beer while Woojin stared at the can in his hands, extremely hot, wondering if he should throw it in the trash anyway. On the other hand, taking more would lead to the looping of discarded beers because it wasn't the kind of thing that you can drink boiling. "How was it?"

"What?"

“You were in the first marches, weren't you? Soyeon told me that. ”

"Stop asking others about me, it's starting to get uncomfortable" Woojin dragged his hips across the bench and rested the back of his neck on the top, feeling the cold of the wood between his hair in need of a cut. He would start to tie them at some point before impatiently pulling them out. "I wasn't there for that"

"I didn't ask, it was a coincidence" Woojin rolled his eyes "And why were you there then?"

"It was where I met Chan"

 

Every relationship had a beginning somewhere, at some time, day, month, year. Woojin wasn't born knowing of anyone's existence, Chan had just crossed his path on a day when Woojin was trying to cross that of others. He was a stupid preteen that had almost been trampled underfoot by a sullen group of vampires who didn't have much sense of their surroundings - or who just saw very badly. He would learn this detail much later and at the moment itself, it seemed only a strong dislike for him to be a human crossing a march that eventually ended with more violent rebukes from both sides. If he could, Woojin would forget without a problem, but it was never really the case.

 

"And how it was?"

"A living hell" He admitted with a hurried response, as an automatic reflection of what his brain was just plotting about. "If I knew I would have crossed the neighborhood in another direction"

"I thought it was a memorable event or something"

“It was, but not exactly positive” It was also not a trauma. Not for him. A novelty would be the most correct term for who at the time thought that vampires were just another freak, but then again, everything was always very strange around him to consider blood-sucking creatures really shocking. Just unusual. “They weren't organized, humans were never peaceful. A lot of people ended up bruised or close to it. ”

"If you didn't want to be there, how did you end up with a friend?"

"I wouldn't say he's my friend"

"So what he is?"

 

Woojin turned his face towards Jisung, realizing his genuine curiosity about an event that he remembered in a different way than himself did. If the question had been asked before - and he certainly had the impression that at some point he portrayed Chan to Jisung as really a friend - saying that now would be an empty lie. It was indisputable that Chan was important to Woojin in some way, he just didn't think it was a feeling of pure friendship or any crap that he would be led to believe just because they had known each other for years. It seemed much more that they filled the loneliness by using each other's presence.

 

"I don't know" He sighed. "Something"

"We are friends, aren't we?"

"We are?"

 

Jisung looked into his eyes again, raising his eyebrows and stopping in the middle of a possible sip from the second can. Or third. Woojin wasn't counting because he wasn't really paying attention. He seemed sober enough to make it past that, and he couldn't say whether it was good or bad that Jisung heard that story and had a good chance of remembering it. It was no big deal, but Woojin wasn't comfortable discussing a relationship with Chan that was probably over with someone else; in addition to the sense of responsibility on both sides for what happened during the first marches.

 

"I consider you my friend" Jisung continued, shrugging nonchalantly. "Why else would you ask me to kill a wolf instead?"

 

It had been a stupid decision that Woojin now saw as a problem. It was a secret between him and Jisung, even though it was reported to the quarters in one way or another. Only Woojin really knew how he found the beta that bit him and only Jisung knew that Woojin was involved in his death and that it wasn't completely accidental. However, the great detail was that Jisung didn't know why Woojin wanted him dead and hadn't really touched on that subject until then.

 

"Yeah, you're right" He decided, not really caring about the nomenclature of anything. "I met Chan that day because he would be trampled if I hadn't taken him out"

"That was really nice of you"

“No, I was a huge asshole. I didn't realize he couldn't see and I must have given a half-hour sermon or something. ” Woojin threw the can in the trash, just half empty. "For something I had also done, by the way."

“That must have been funny” Jisung laughed as if he had heard the best of jokes “When I was younger I was almost swallowed by a crocodile. It was definitely an experience. ”

"You're inconsequential"

"A little, but I try to avoid it" Woojin watched Jisung bend over and pick up another beer, handing it towards him when he saw he empty-handed. Although he accepted, Woojin doesn't even try to open it. “It feels good to be alive, it's something you only feel when you're close to dying.”

"This is the most stupid thing I've ever seen to justify an even more stupid behavior"

“They are equivalent. You aren't exactly balanced either. ”

"I don't feed myself to the crocodiles"

"No, you mess with worse"

 

Woojin knew exactly what Jisung meant, taking into account that even though Yuri wasn't present, she must have kept him up to date on what she knew about the Choi family case - they hadn't gone into the matter further, but it wasn't like every department no longer knew that. And in more ways than was visible, Woojin seemed to go up against figures that could devour him in a single bite; even though he looked cautious, he still acted like a runaway car and headed straight for the wolf's mouth. Very ironically.

 

"Don't do what I have done so far, at some point there will be no turning back"

"But as long as it still works, it's okay"

"Do you really think it's that easy?"

"It's less complicated than it looks" Jisung seemed to think, pursing his lips. “I mean, at least when it involves people there is always the possibility to forgive and forget. It gets more difficult when you deal with the government, but there are people who decrease the sentence when they admit it, right? ”

"You are unbelievable" Woojin opened the can again, without removing the aluminum ring this time, more concerned with taking a sip of the drink while still cold. "I'm almost sure you don't even know what we're talking about anymore"

“I thought we were talking about being inconsequential. Or about not knowing what to name things ” Woojin thought he shouldn't have agreed to get into that kind of subject. "You said earlier that you don't get any calls and you have no one to call"

"Yeah, I don't"

"You can call me sometimes, I like to talk" Noticeable, Woojin already knew that trait from the moment Jisung was introduced as part of his team. "And you don't seem to be talking much recently"

“What a sherlock”

"Really" Jisung turned his body to Woojin, who didn't move, this time with his eyes fixed on the shadow of the lamppost on the almost empty street. People were beginning to disappear, closing doors and locking shops around. "I didn't expect you to be with someone the last time I went to your house and it still felt like you were just visiting there too"

“I don't have a habit of organizing, I don't stay at home” Not that he moved much of the place, in the same way. It had never changed anything. "All I do is eat and sleep, I don't have to move the furniture, fill the counter with packages of condiment or any nonsense at that level"

“It sounds really lonely”

"I never worried about having someone around after my grandfather died"

"Everything looks like it was from five decades ago" Jisung smiled despite everything. "Good to know that you just don't have bad taste but laziness."

"I don't belong anywhere" Woojin took another sip of his beer, the sigh caught in his throat being suppressed by the gesture. He was tired of being alone, but admitting it out loud was another thing. It was much more complicated and complex, it required a lot of energy for those who seemed to be saving as much as they could for keep going day after day. "I won't raise a family, I won't marry and have children, I won't adopt a dog, I won't act as if my job gives me the opportunity for any of this"

“Well, I plan to get married. Maybe not having children, but it would be nice. ”

"So change jobs while you can" It wasn't his most optimistic advice, he spoke from experience, but he ignored the fact that the biggest cause for his loneliness was still himself.

 

Indirectly, Woojin put Jisung too much into a problem that went far beyond his knowledge. He hoped that with those words Jisung would rethink something he had no control over. He couldn't leave him the same kind of fate he wanted - and he would, however bad the situation was - allow Chan to manipulate from then on. The best he could and which he hadn't done up to now was symbolic freedom from whatever put them in the position of a relationship built from a deficient perspective.

That was bad, He knew it was. Seeing life so close to death and in a totally stagnant way didn't bring to Woojin the feeling that Jisung had acclaimed moments before. He was no longer complacent about anything because he might not wake up the next Monday. It had been a miserable life, truly a pity. He had nothing to leave behind but a pile of excuses that went from blaming his parents to the causes of the bite he received. In the ears of others, it was never really his problem, but Woojin listened, too loudly, every time the consequences of his actions were shouting his name in the air. He couldn't run from this forever.

 

"We should go" Woojin stood up, taking the abandoned sports bag beside the bench and letting Jisung take the rest of the burden of the drink himself had bought, anyway. Woojin's second beer had warmed up again, but he would have to discard it a little further on the way home. "I don't want to deal with any hungry vampires today"

"They can be nice sometimes" Jisung clapped his hands on his clothes and discarded the empty can, bringing the bundle onto the bench before stretching the rest of his body. He was completely sober, still. "Or at least you can negotiate something in return, young blood is tasty"

"Go home, Jisung" The soldier put one hand in his jacket pocket, swinging the can in circles in the opposite hand. "It's a friend's advice"

"Do you want one too?"

 

He was ready to answer that no, even if he had nothing under control and at the moment everything he needed to breathe well was really a positive word, of comfort, or whatever was expected of a friend that Woojin clearly didn't associate very well. But Jisung said nothing of what he really expected him to say, even if it served the situation in one way or another.

 

“Get some sleep. You have horrible dark circles under your eyes.”

 

 

- ⥉ -

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, dear readers
> 
> I don't really know how many people will read and follow this up, I don't even know if I should really come here to talk about this particular subject, but I feel like I should give my opinion on the news we received today.
> 
> All my ongoing stories, or the ones I have planned, have Woojin as the protagonist. Woojin is someone I've seen growing up inside Stray Kids, growing up with me, since we're the same age, in ways that make me proud of what he has become. An example for so many, a person with a good heart, a voice that soothes and relax. I don't mean to stop writing with him, creating stories that keep his name alive within the fandom. I don't want to erase what he helped build and every new stay that comes along, I make a point of showing the best of the moments he had with us.
> 
> I will not stop doing what I do. This story will continue and I will still do many others extolling what he means to me (even though I may not know how to represent 1/10 of what he is and sometimes use his name to make way for unjust behavior). Although I don't do an exact representation of him, I leave here, for a while, what I have closest to a tribute to him and what he represented along his walk with us, stays, and stray kids. Woojin, our hero, our enchanted prince. His name is marked in the building of this group and in the path of each of us as writers. He left a little of him in everyone who knew him and it won't be me letting it go with his leaving.
> 
> I just wanted to point out that I support any decision he takes because I love him and always will. Even if he is not present, the love he has left will be sown and grown more and more. We are nine or none.


End file.
